


coffees and cranes (and everything but love)

by theproseofnight



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: A lot of banging, All the cuddles, F/F, Fluff and Feels, Friends With Benefits, No Strings Attached, Smut, and a smidgen of anal, every string attached, like a lot, none of the feelings, opposite of a slow burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-04
Updated: 2021-01-01
Packaged: 2021-03-05 01:34:40
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 65,535
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25076212
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theproseofnight/pseuds/theproseofnight
Summary: “So ... what is this for you? What am I to you?”“You’re my six months.”ORClarke’s art studio overlooks the Brooklyn construction site where architect Lexa supervises the new development. After meeting with a bang, a heated first encounter turns into weekly coffee dates then into a friendship with extensive benefits. Casual, simple.Just sex. That's the deal. Everythingbutlove.ORTwo horny idiots.
Relationships: Clarke Griffin/Lexa
Comments: 164
Kudos: 1163





	1. of beans and banging

**Author's Note:**

> If you're in need of some light-fare, summer smut, with a side of feels, here you go ... FWB au of [Except You Love](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13602705) where Clarke and Lexa meet later in life—and insist (too ardently) on not falling in love.
> 
> As its own self-contained story, this can be read independently of Except You Love, so no prior knowledge of EYL is necessary. There are, however, nuggets and Easter eggs for those who have read it!

*********

_— I. The construction site —_

It starts with a bang.

Then several.

The sound builds and builds.

Graduating to a booming, jackhammering of noises. The ground has been shaking underneath her studio apartment for two solid weeks. Incessant.

When the construction hoardings had started going up Clarke had groaned, yet another condo building coming into her Brooklyn neighbourhood. From the advertising, it looked to be equally flashy and unimaginative and as astronomically expensive as all the others. Cheap land and an artist’s haven have long drawn hipsters into the area like avocado to toast, attracting along with them developers’ capitalist gaze. As a consequence, her leafy street has seen an exponential rise in property values, which in turn spiked the price of the fruit, and at the moment, her temper as well. While the pace of gentrification is headache-inducing as always, it has never made her floor _vibrate_.

A rare loft space doubling as a gallery and studio, with streams of North light, is the trade off of living and working at the bustling centre of one of New York’s most active development sites. Here first before the selfie crowd and glitterati started moving in, she refuses to be displaced by an ironic haircut. Handlebar moustaches are harmless and mostly ignorable. Usually anyway, but resistance is increasingly futile. The more the ground shook the more Clarke feels the urge to throw a fixie bike out from her seventh floor fire escape.

Perhaps it’s the lack of sleep from the fevered productivity that pulled up the sun without notice when two blinks of an eye ago the moon had hung high. Perhaps it’s the unsolicited and unconscionable 7:00 am wake up call in the form of rattling windows that disrupted a near-breakthrough on one challenging part of her painting. Perhaps it’s because of a cold bed whose frost had coincided with her artist block, frustration precipitating sexless months. (Or maybe the other way around, she can’t tell at this point.)

Whatever the case, Clarke couldn’t take it anymore after a particularly hard shake caused the bucket of paint to slip out of her hand. It was the last straw, jolting her into action.

“How’d you get in here— Ma’am, you can’t go in there!” A large man in a white hard hat and a too small, bright yellow vest tries to intervene. Gesturing vaguely at the hole in the fence she had just easily squeezed through, Clarke advances towards the source of her morning aggravation, uninvited and undeterred. “Visitors need to check in with the office,” his scruffy words trail behind her but they go unheeded as does his entreaty to observe onsite protocol, “a hard hat at least!”

When she doesn’t answer him, only staring menacingly at the racket two feet away from where she finally stops short of muddy dirt, standing unmoving with fists clenched, he seems to give up and lumbers away. The machinery roars on, not bothered by the silent judgment and ball of rage hurled its way. If it’s possible for nonsentient equipment to emote, Clarke swears she sees it shrug a shoulder.

Minutes later, at a tap on _her_ shoulder, Clarke whips around, ready to direct her ire at the newest target. Prepared to take on another burly man of unreasonable height and width, she stumbles slightly when faced instead with a startlingly beautiful woman in a fitted suit. Much smaller and slimmer. The crispness of her deep blue blazer and white shirt tucked into cigarette pants stand out from the sea of neon orange and yellow-cladded men industriously dotting about.

A curious gaze takes Clarke in.

Brilliant green eyes peep through from under a black hard hat that sits slightly askew and struggles to contain flyaway strands of hair. By the clumsy state of half-laced construction boots, there was an obvious rush to intercept the trespasser upon alert.

With some difficulty of processing the unexpected visual, Clarke tracks the entire ensemble from gorgeous head to steel-covered toes: whatever the opposite of the stereotype of brute builder is, must be this runway model casually showing off the latest well-tailored Tom Ford for Her.

The contrast is jarring.

Normally, Clarke’s reaction would be some squeal of incredulity, _how can one person’s everything be so attractive_ , if speech hadn’t left her.

“Pardon me?” follows a blush and a lifted, amused, eyebrow.

_Shit, was that said out loud?_

“Yes.”

_Shit again._

Later, she will blame it on her sleep-deprived stupor, but in the moment, rather than acknowledging the slips, Clarke licks her lips and rubs fists into her eyes like a cartoon, trying to clear the haziness from her vision. Out of her peripheral, she sees a forklift that might be useful to return her jaw off the floor.

It just ... infuriates her more, feeling misplaced anger towards the curve of a mouth and the cut of a jaw; rage against cheekbones that sit stupidly high.

Before she can close her mouth from openly gawking, the space between them narrows without warning and a helmet is placed atop her own head, causing dual hitches of breath.

“Safety first,” the non-burly, non-brute woman justifies the breach of personal space, adjusting the protective headwear to fit over Clarke’s morning mess of a mop. After abandoning her workstation and brushes, there was little time for anything other than a loosely tied bun, which has now flattened under industrial-grade plastic. Clarke makes a non-committal hum, distracted by the unique cadence of an unexpectedly soft voice, the air of her expelled breath hits against exceptionally close eyelashes. Cheeks tint a pretty pink in minor embarrassment over a sudden awareness of their proximity. The woman takes a polite step back, before making a gentle but firm inquiry into the trespassing, “Can I help you?”

Recovering from her momentary lapse, Clarke crosses her arms and puts on her best scowl.

“You’re the one...” she starts, but instead of finishing the truant thought, _weirdly making my stomach flutter_ , ends with, “responsible for this,” pointing down to the spilt paint covering the bottom half of her shirt.

In lieu of an answer, she gets a quirked eyebrow and a mirroring of crossed arms. “Am I? Is it weird?”

Foregoing explanation and the latter question, Clarke presses on, switching gears, “Is this your dirt?”

“As lead architect, you could say this is my ground.”

“Then as head ground controller, you need to tell them to drill more quietly.”

The request is met with a light chuckle. “Sorry?”

“ _That_.” Clarke waves emphatically behind her before cupping her ears like Dumbo in show of the noise nuisance.

Features soften into something completely at odds with the hard materials and rough surfaces surrounding where they stand.

“This is a construction site,” she’s told with a smile struggling to stay small. As if the machinery and beehive activity of the workers aren’t telling enough. Accompanying the stating of the obvious, the look of amusement would otherwise be appealing if pretty lips didn’t antagonise Clarke further that her disrupted productivity isn’t being taken seriously.

“It’s been non-stop. Isn’t the hole large enough already?”

“Boreholes can run several hundred feet below ground.”

“Are you digging to China?”

“Kelly.”

Thrown off by the name offering, Clarke feels compelled by manners to return the introduction. She stretches her hand out on automatic pilot, “Clarke.”

The butterflies turn rampant as the smile brightens and long fingers wrap gently around hers. If this Kelly person feels the same odd spark Clarke does when their skin touches, she hides it well. “Lexa.”

“Kelly-Lexa?”

“No,” the multi-name architect laughs before correcting Clarke’s confusion, “just Lexa.”

“Who’s Kelly?”

To think of it, Lexa doesn’t look much like a Kelly. _Lexa_ seems to fit her well.

“Kelly drilling is a dry rotary method used to produce bored piles.” Lexa directs Clarke’s attention to the telescopic, hydraulic shaft battering away without care for their boring discourse on boring holes and piles. When Clarke stares at her unresponsive as if Lexa had just spewed quantum theory, she elaborates, “A bored pile is the concrete filling the hole we drill into the ground to make the foundation.”

The explanation is still beyond Clarke’s grasp and well above an insomniac’s ability to take in complex information.

“Well, tell Kelly to keep quiet because I’ve got an exhibition deadline and now more midnight blue on cotton than should be on canvas.”

Clarke lifts the hem of her shirt higher in show. At the inadvertent reveal of pale skin, startled green eyes widen perceptibly before quickly averting their gaze from the few inches of exposed stomach.

“Kelly did that?”

“My entire apartment _shook_ , Lexa.”

Credit to Lexa, she looks genuinely contrite. “I apologise, Clarke, on behalf of Kelly.”

Clarke doesn’t realise they are still holding hands until Lexa tugs hers to signal her sincerity.

“Yeah, okay,” Clarke says, abruptly letting go but not without feeling a hint of disappointment at the loss of contact. “Just, no more drilling.”

“I can’t promise that.”

”What?” Whatever goodwill Lexa’s apology garners is erased by her uncooperativeness. Clarke’s scowl deepens. “Why not?”

“My guys are on a schedule too.”

“For what? So that beautiful women in expensive suits can meet their quarterly profit margins with another overpriced condo that local residents can’t afford and I have to buy $12 pumpkin spice crappuccino from the record store slash bike repair shop slash coffee shop that’ll inevitably open and force my favourite café to close down?”

Clarke ends her blustering rant on a deep exhale. Lexa looks slightly impressed by the passionate delivery of her opinion on urban regeneration.

“You think I’m beautiful?”

She’s thrown off by what Lexa chooses to focus on.

“Not when you’re making all this noise,” Clarke retorts, not taking her eye off the ball, even when it wants to roam the cut of Lexa’s figure. (God, she really needs to get laid soon.)

“Local law 113 allows construction to occur between 7:00 am and 6:00 pm on weekdays,” Lexa tells her, reciting the memorised by-law with the authority of someone unaccustomed to being challenged. “We also have a special permit for Kelly and her jackhammering friends. You can report noise from our building construction activity if it occurs _before_ or _after_ hours.”

Not being intimately, or at all, familiar with New York City’s noise ordinances, Clarke has no rebuttal. A stolen glance down to her watch, 7:16 am, lets her know the architect and her grounds people are well within their rights to aggravate Clarke.

“Just ... keep it down.”

Clarke huffs then storms off. The picture of an angry lion (wearing a hard hat) fleeing the scene.

— _II. The coffee —_

The next time they meet days later, Clarke’s shirt becomes casualty yet again.

“Fuck!”

“Oh my god, I’m so sorry. Are you ok ... oh, it’s —”

“ _You_.” Clarke gapes at her assailant, disbelieving her luck.

She is in Lexa’s arms post collision, pressed against her chest so closely that Clarke is able to take in golden flecks and freckles that went unnoticed during their heated first encounter. Full lashes fanning against bloomed cheeks do their part to finish the dust rose palette.

“You’re hot.” Lexa’s soft voice breaks them out of their staring contest.

“What?”

“You’re hot, erm, wet ...” Lexa’s floundering doesn’t help to clear Clarke’s confusion until she looks down pointedly at Clarke’s shirt, which is sporting a light brown stain.

Three quarters of specialty roast coffee pools on the floor and the remaining quarter is nicely dampening one of her favourite band tees.

Lexa, aiming to be helpful, starts fanning the bottom of her shirt but her fingers graze against Clarke’s stomach, which does nothing to cool down temperatures.

“I’m fine, thank you.” Clarke clears her throat and flusters to swat Lexa’s hands away.

“Oh, shit. Clarke, I’m so sorry,” Lexa repeats. Horrifyingly, mouth formed in ‘O’ shape, she looks ready to blow on Clarke as the next possible solution to making amends. “I didn’t see you and I tend to be two left footed anywhere that’s not a construction site. I’m good with my hands but not so much with my feet. No, that’s a lie. I do okay when music is involved. Anya tells me I can be mildly rhythmic when I try.”

She’s rambling. It’s cute and adorable and Clarke is unable to process it because Lexa’s arm is tightly wound around her waist and this is the most intimate embrace Clarke has experienced since an unmemorable hook-up with an even less memorable photographer last winter. The fingers currently, gently, pushed into the small of her back causes a charge a thousand times more electric to surge through her body. She feels a heat that has nothing to do with the hot drink while her heart does a poor job at not skipping at the thought of just _how_ _good_ Lexa is with her hands.

“Really, Lexa, it’s ok,” Clarke reassures, disentangling from their pretzel shape, hoping her voice doesn’t betray her thirst. “It’s thick cotton and the liquid hasn’t soaked through yet.”

“Still, can I make it up to you?” Lexa asks, eyes wide in supplication. “Let me buy you another coffee.”

It’s 6:30 am and Clarke is in the middle of another bout of overnight creativity. She had only come down to refuel because the beans here at Wood St Café next door to her building produce the least pretentious but most delicious flat white. Little in the way of literally running into the attractive, clumsy architect had been part of her morning plan. Any divergence from an end-of-day goal to finish the base layer of her piece would adversely affect her momentum. Yet, Clarke newly discovers, she has a particular weakness for the forming pout.

“Please, I insist,” Lexa continues at Clarke’s hesitation, bottom lip jutted out in full persuasive force. “It’s the least I can do with how much input I seem to have into the diminishing state of your wardrobe.”

The bite to her lip makes the decision for Clarke, who can only nod and extricate herself from Lexa’s warm embrace.

“I’ll have the Peruvian then. I like its notes of roasted hazelnut and orange,” she acquiesces.

Lexa’s whole face brightens and shoulders relax. She nods decisively like she’s just been assigned an important mission, wordlessly handing Clarke her hard hat, and makes her way into the shop with renewed purpose.

Rather than stand awkwardly at the door and in the way of early risers’s caffeine pilgrimage to the neighbourhood hotspot, Clarke finds an empty table by the window, setting the hat down on the sill. She makes liberal use of a nearby stack of paper napkins to absorb her spilt drink, and sends a grateful smile to one of the servers mopping up their mess.

By the time her cleanup job counterproductively makes monochromatic Jackson Pollock-esque art out of her top, Lexa returns with two full hands and a brown paper bag held strategically between her teeth. Identical paper cups are set down between them and, in front of Lexa, a small mountain of food; a plate of avocado on toasted sourdough with sea salt, cracked black pepper, lime and watercress, and topped by a poached egg and smoked salmon.

“I hope you don’t mind, I skipped breakfast this morning,” Lexa says sheepishly once she removes the bag from her mouth, then pushes it entreatingly across the table towards Clarke. “I wasn’t sure if you were hungry too. It’s their special ham and cheese croissant. The secret honey mustard glaze, I’m told, is disturbingly good.” Lexa smiles, adding a fine point to her sell. “Here, I got you two.”

Clarke blinks at her, not expecting the thoughtfulness, however, Lexa misinterprets her silence as discontent for getting the order wrong.

“Shit. Do you not eat cheese? They said the Gruyere is really good, but if you’re anti-dairy then I could get you something else.”

Lexa is halfway out of her seat again to rectify the presumed error, only stopped by Clarke’s hand wrapping around her wrist.

“It’s good, thanks. I _am_ pro-cheese,” Clarke informs, which smooths the worry lines of Lexa’s forehead. “Their croissants are possibly my favourite thing in the world. Sometimes they make ’em with prosciutto instead of ham. Basically sex wrapped in pastry.”

While Clarke blushes at disclosing too much information, Lexa looks pleased at the revelation and visibly relieved to have chosen right. She sits back down and begins digging into her breakfast in earnest, attacking the avocado with equal grace and gusto.

Clarke watches semi-awed by the speed of Lexa’s consumption, her own movements more gingerly when she sips from her coffee, sighing deeply in satisfaction as the caffeine hits and warms her throat. She has to stifle a moan but Lexa has no such reservation.

“Oh god,” Lexa purrs past the eddying steam after a second savouring drag from her cup. “I’m more a tea than coffee person but I could definitely convert for this.” Her eyes twinkle as she quotes back Clarke’s description. “I’m now completely sold on _Peruvian with notes of roasted hazelnut and orange_.”

Clarke smiles, something she can’t seem to stop doing ever since colliding into Lexa, once the shock fell away. She hides the pull of her lips against the croissant, taking a generous bite while Lexa takes another generous swig.

Given their bumpy start and the earlier literal bump-in, it wouldn’t have crossed her mind that they would be sharing a table and having a civil sit down but, Clarke has the distinct feeling that _Lexa_ is an unfolding surprise, an introduction into Clarke’s life the first of many bucked expectations.

She doesn’t have to wait long for it to prove true. Within minutes of finishing one portion of her breakfast, Lexa pulls out from her work bag what appears to be oversized red ear muffs with an antennae.

“Though not much I can do about your vibrating floor, these should help,” Lexa offers and pushes the pair of headphones to Clarke with the same sheepish look as she had proffered the croissants. “They’re noise-cancelling. I’ve got another set in my trailer, you can have this one.”

Clarke’s objection to the generous gesture is waved off by Lexa’s insistence that it’s a small token of her sincere apology to make up for the noise grievance. Future Clarke is thankful she does eventually accept—they do help to de-escalate Kelly’s and the grounders disturbance from high key rage to low key annoyance—but present Clarke just gawks while Lexa extolls the features. Comfy adjustable headband, AM/FM digital tuning, LCD display for clock, playback compatibility with smart phones, and most importantly, effective hearing protection.

All Clarke hears, however, is more reinforcement of Lexa’s thoughtfulness, overriding any lingering perception of what Clarke had initially mistaken to be inconsideration. Whatever hostility left over from the construction site dissipates with each fortifying swallow of coffee while listening. (The smiles across the table help too.)

Luckily, she’s not mid-sip and at risk of burning her tongue when Lexa is inspired to breach Clarke’s personal space again and fits the headphones over her head. Suddenly, the din of the café quiets to a murmur, Lexa’s speech reduced to a pantomime, lips moving and hands gesticulating animatedly. A near silence save for the rush of Clarke’s pulse ringing loudly at Lexa’s proximity. Clarke gives a thumbs up to vouch for the sound quality and muffling capability. That seems to appease Lexa into retaking her seat.

The subject fortunately changes back to the quality of beans once Lexa’s excitement settles, a cute fist pump when Clarke agrees to the gift. With the scent of Lexa’s presumably really expensive hair product a safer distance away, it allows Clarke to return to her comfort zone.

“One of the baristas has family in Peru that owns a cocoa farm,” Clarke shares about their coffees’ origin. “Once you get a taste of Wood’s, nothing else really compares.”

Something akin to delight crosses Lexa’s face before it breaks into a beaming smile that piques Clarke’s interest as to what has her eyes twinkling so brilliantly.

“I’m a Woods.”

Clarke stares at her blankly, the revelation not yet computing because the column of Lexa’s neck arches attractively, _distractedly_ , as her head tilts back in open laughter. The sound skates pleasantly along the hairs of Clarke’s skin. Clarke’s trance is broken when Lexa stretches an arm across the table.

“Lexa Woods, to be precise. Though no relation, I have been told something similar. Something of a singular experience.”

Catching up to the inadvertent implication of her own statement, heat races up Clarke’s chest, neck and cheeks, as well as elsewhere in the opposite direction. She shakes Lexa’s waiting hand anyway, though misjudges the distance and ends up clasping her forearm. Like on the construction site and before at the door, they hold onto each other for far longer than social norms until Lexa lets go to shift attention back to eating. The satisfied smile not leaving her face for awhile.

There’s a companionable silence as Lexa concentrates on her meal and Clarke concentrates on not watching the movements of her mouth.

“So, you art?” “You’re a hipster?”

They both ask at the same time a minute later, speaking over the other.

“Sorry, you first,” Lexa yields, smiling.

“Yeah, my studio’s next door. The loft overlooks your site.”

Clarke gives her a significant look, narrowing her eyes playfully, that Lexa misses (or wilfully ignores) in favour of devouring her food.

“The GE building?” Lexa asks without looking up from her plate, continuing to consume avocado at an alarming rate. She’s nearly done while Clarke hasn’t made much of a dent beyond the first bite. “It’s a great space.”

In a previous life, it was a manufacturing outlet for the lighting giant General Electric, since converted into artists residence and workshops. The former factory, with its rare textured brickwork, oversized steel frame windows expanding across generous floor-to-ceiling heights, and its northwest orientation, is a dream space for an artist like Clarke who works with light and raw materials.

The conversation picks up as Clarke tells her about her work and upcoming show in Soho in the new year. Her attentive audience makes the words flow easily. Lexa hums and nods and interjects with questions at the right intervals but mainly sticks to her chewing and lets Clarke talk.

It’s distracting, with lips so kissable and soft-looking, Clarke can’t help but imagine them bruised pink and blue, pliant under the pressure of her own. She’s always been ambivalent of avocado, neither particularly fond nor overly critical, yet watching bits of it get occasionally licked by a seeking tongue, she’s suddenly jealous of a food group favoured by one segment of millennials.

“You never answered,” Clarke reminds when she sees an opening to turn the tables for Lexa to share about herself. Pointing to Lexa’s plate, she asks, “Hipster?”

“I have hips, yes.” Lexa smiles, soft and conspiratorial, like she’s letting Clarke in on a poorly kept secret. (They’re kind of unmissable. Clarke couldn’t help notice the sway and swell of Lexa’s hips when she approached the table after retrieving their order.) “But no, not a hipster. Just an early avocado adopter.”

“How early?” At Clarke’s nudge to hear more while unconsciously stealing a fallen chunk off her plate, Lexa goes into detail about avocado’s high placement in her food hierarchy order.

There’s an interesting contradiction to Lexa’s ways, her general calmness and carriage versus unfettered enthusiasm for the fruit. She revisits memories of her dad wooing her mom with the ’berry delicacy’ and how he had passed down his terrible cooking skills and avowed love of the botanical pear onto Lexa.

Talk of avocados segue into anecdotes about Lexa’s parents, Augustus and Alexandria (her namesake), her sister, Anya, and the Woods fondness for the letter A.

As she speaks affectionately of her family, with notable longing on mentions of her mom, this Lexa colours in the faint outline of the one Clarke met two days ago. Funny, kind, _charming_. Add to it the croissants and the headphones, the whole package makes Clarke regretful of her onsite terseness and pre-judgements.

Letting the morning stretch organically this time rather than bending it to her will, Clarke is engrossed by what she learns, by Lexa’s soft timbre, drawn further into her sphere. It flames the spark of attraction from their initial interaction on site that had doggedly followed her back to the apartment since walking away post noise complaint. The face featured in the _vivid_ dream of that day’s afternoon nap, and subsequent ones, was too incriminating to admit to her mother during a later chat, why Clarke’s been losing sleep.

She must be staring without realising because Lexa gently taps the back of her hand on the table to get her attention.

“Something in my teeth?”

“No, no, you’re fine. You just ...” Clarke gives her an appraising once-over, “look different today. No suit.”

Lexa is outfitted in durable sandstone workwear that’s more appropriate for dirt and dust collection than the previous soft Italian fibres but dons it with similar sartorial elegance. Clarke imagines few people can rock Carthartt and couture with the same allure. The paradox is striking, adding a nuanced layer to the emerging picture Clarke forms of the architect.

“Blazers are not my usual. Flannel is more my speed,” Lexa notes, seemingly dropping a hint that Clarke doesn’t fail to pick up. “I had a meeting that morning with the big bosses,” she explains, returning on topic. “My first of the project actually.”

It turns out, Lexa, though a native New Yorker, is in fact based out of the UK and recently returned stateside to follow through on a project of which she’s part of the design team. The multi-million dollar joint venture development had been conceived in her East London office, Lexa explains. She was contracted to ensure early onsite design compliance, which goes well over Clarke’s head as to what that exactly entails but the enthusiasm with which she speaks of getting to spend an extended amount of time back in the US—six months, until after Thanksgiving—and getting to see part of her design realised, has Clarke internally cheerleading her on as well.

Clarke understands. She knows of the reward of witnessing the fruits of one’s labour bearing after working so hard. Riding the success of her last group show the year before, where according to all the major art blogs her work had stood out for its clever use of colour, Clarke has been burning the candle at both ends to prepare for her first solo exhibition in January.

With an odd feeling she can’t describe, Clarke realises that Lexa, who will have returned to London by the end of November, won’t be around to see her show. Clarke isn’t sure why she feels anything at all, least of which disappointment or sadness, about Lexa’s impermanence in her city. They barely know each other.

But as Lexa talks animatedly about the building—a programme of mixed-use that includes a community centre and affordable youth arts education workshops on the first two ground floors, proving Clarke had prejudged its gentrifying objectives—an unplaceable warmth _builds_ in her chest. She feels strangely endeared to the breathlessness Lexa has towards poured-in concrete.

She takes Lexa in anew. Despite the short time, their connection is palpable, the chemistry undeniable. Were Clarke looking to fill an absence in her life and not presently busy instead trying to make a name for herself as an artist, Lexa would be the ideal _someone_.

Someone who makes her stomach flip at the unsubtle glances thrown her way, Lexa’s eyes constantly tracking between her own and the beauty mark sitting above Clarke’s lips. Clarke fights a competing impulse to pay sole attention to the cut of Lexa’s jaw and the rise and fall of her mouth, how it forms and un-forms with her unique enunciation over certain vowels or consonants.

Like now.

“Clarke?”

“Hmm?” Clarke shakes out of her runaway thoughts. “Sorry, I spaced out for a second.”

“Poured concrete not doing it for you?”

Clarke laughs and shakes her head, pretending like she has a clue about the direction their conversation has taken on building foundations. “ _Fascinating_. Who knew the curing rate of concrete could be so compelling,” she deadpans.

Lexa nods in fervent agreement, misreading Clarke’s sarcasm as sincerity. “As David Chipperfield says, the difference between good and bad architecture is the time you spend on it.”

“The magician?” Clarke asks, furrowing her brow at why the illusionist would have an opinion on architecture other than maybe incorporating it as part of his disappearing acts.

Her confusion prompts a lovely burst of laughter from Lexa. “ _Chipperfield_ , not Copperfield. He’s an English architect who does amazing things with concrete. Really inspiring work. There’s this one chapel on a hillside north of Osaka that’s pigmented pink and looks stunning against the mountains. I would love to visit it someday.”

For an unknown reason, Clarke hopes to do so as well, with her. Not only because of Lexa’s description of how the visitor centre and chapel are designed as a marked threshold between the outside world and a quieter space within for contemplation, or how the memorial room is partitioned into smaller rooms by pleated curtains made from washi paper and fabric; but because the light in her eyes flicker indecisively between blue and green as she speaks animatedly about the concrete building—and Clarke wants to witness which cool end of the colour spectrum they’ll land on when Lexa’s gaze sets upon the structure in person.

“Your someday sounds amazing,” Clarke says, wistful, when Lexa describes how her ideal travel plans would include a stopover in Jaipur to see India’s pink city for a necessary colour reference to evaluate its variant in the Japanese prefecture. “If you do make it there, send pics. The artist in me needs visual confirmation about all this pink.”

Barely acquaintances let alone friends, it’s a bold statement—resting entirely on the premise that Clarke would even be in the picture to be on the receiving end of postcards—but Lexa only smiles at the prospect, before making her own, bolder one. “Or you come with me and see for yourself.”

Although a lofty thought, all imagination and little rooted in reality, nonetheless, it doesn’t stop Clarke from envisioning the possibility. Two near-strangers taking a once-in-a-lifetime trip together, traversing across the desert plains of the Rajasthan state by camel to arrive at the peninsula of the Kensai region on a bullet train with nothing but sketchbooks and smiles between them. Clarke’s field of vision and presence of mind are usually constrained to the easel two feet in front of her, so she recognises it’s somewhat ridiculous to time-jump and project geographically so far beyond the reach of her next brushstroke, but is helpless anyway to stop the daydreaming prompted by the tilt of Lexa’s smile. At the very least, by her minutiae description of the landscapes that await discovery, Clarke fights a sudden, pressing need to run upstairs and check the expiry date of her passport.

(Were Octavia and Raven here, her best friends would slap the gay goggles off her. Without their sardonic needling, she indulges freely in the wanderlust fantasy.)

As Lexa finishes her avo toastie, their banter stopping short of flirting, Clarke finds she really enjoys Lexa’s company. They click in a way she had not anticipated, their rapport unbalances her to a degree that’s not unwelcomed. There is such fluidity to their chatter, it makes the fluttering low in her belly a nonstop sensation, handily winning over any concerns about the speed of their connection that should give her pause.

The impromptu breakfast ends on a much better footing and shared understanding than how the morning had started. It does, however, leave Clarke somewhat conflicted whether Lexa is someone she wants to befriend or disrobe, the pull of both equally strong.

When Lexa realises the time, much later than she should have stayed, the niggling sense of disappointment returns as Clarke accepts her regret for cutting their time short before dashing off, parting on an apology again about her clumsiness. She forgets her hard hat, unwittingly leaving Clarke with a second one and, along with the headphones, tripling the amount of construction personal protective equipment in her possession.

After vacating her seat as well, Clarke is fairly shocked to read the second hand of the café’s clock passing 8:30 am. Not short at all. Twice now, Clarke is left with an impression of Lexa that’s more than paint and coffee stains.

— _III. The contract —_

By the third and fourth time they share another, thankfully collision-free, morning cup, Clarke is convinced nothing about Lexa is accidental. Some meddling force of the universe is keen on making her an everyday part of Clarke’s life. Why else would Lexa and coffee and Clarke _trying_ not to think of her lips become a twice weekly routine.

On Tuesdays and Thursdays, more than once she has burnt the tip of her tongue on the hot beverage when her gaze lingers too long watching Lexa savour hers. Trawling the line between blossoming companionship and open but unacknowledged flirtation, the coffee dates become a temporal metric of Clarke’s week, a peak distraction if not a marker of lost self-restraint against pretty girls with the ability to narrow Clarke’s world to the rim of a ceramic cup. With newfound desire to switch to pottery arts, never has she felt such appetence to be a mug than wanting in the moment, every time Lexa takes a sip, to gain first-hand knowledge of how hardened clay bends under the pressure of soft lips.

Perfectly timed, the bend of light striking through the café window and falling delicately— _painterly_ —across Lexa’s face competes for her attention. It is only because of an artist’s appreciation, Clarke justifies, that she commits the soft hue to memory, for later reproduction on canvas, of course, and not because Lexa’s silhouette and the sublime slope of her nose belongs in a Dutch golden age painting. Recalling how the German painter Max Liebermann once wrote of Holland’s countryside that ‘the mists that rise from the water and shroud the world in a translucent veil give that country its extraordinarily picturesque quality … everything is bathed in light and air,’ if Clarke finds parallel in the steam of coffee and the stream of sunlight basking Lexa to stunning chiaroscuro effect, then it’s mere coincidence.

She catalogues the unique hue for future use, certain the paint chip is not available off the shelf and that she’ll have to mix the colours herself.

Lexa breaks her out of the rumination with a coincident observation.

“I didn’t realise blue could look transparent,” Lexa comments, staring intently at Clarke and then, before Clarke can ask for clarification, she reaches across to gently sweep an errant strand of hair away from her eyes.

With caffeine sunrises forming a new shared habit, their growing comfort and affability with each other has lulled Clarke into a false sense of security about her clothes’ safety from further incident. So, it comes as a surprise that, when Lexa’s fingers graze her cheek on withdrawal, Clarke’s startled reaction to the static charge causes Lexa’s hand to knock over Clarke’s drink halfway paused at her mouth, and spill onto her top.

Lexa immediately looks mortified, hand suspended midair in disbelief over her repeated clumsiness. Clarke has to laugh and jokes, “I sense that me and liquids are not meant to be around you.”

“Oh my god, I’m sorry.”

“That one was on me,” Clarke says and waves her off, congenial. “I guess lucky me I went with an ice latte today. Maybe I should start wearing brown exclusively from now on.”

“This is so embarrassing. It’s been awhile talking to a pretty girl but I swear I’m not this klutzy.” Lexa defends while Clarke stuffs napkins down her chest in an attempt to put distance between her shirt and skin at the sudden coldness. Clarke doesn’t miss the compliment but Lexa’s verbosity prevents a revisit. “I didn’t mean to, it’s just ... the light,” Lexa continues and points accusingly to the brightening sun presumably halo-ing Clarke’s head behind her, “and you’re so pretty and I didn’t think and just totally breached your personal space without permission because your hair looked so soft and yellow that it gave me this urge to touch but it fell into your eye and was in the way of a blue I’ve never seen before. It’s an unbelievable shade—” Lexa’s rambling cuts off abruptly like she realises belatedly that all of it was said out loud. Her face flushes further in embarrassment, hand flying over her mouth to preempt additional involuntary admissions.

It’s adorable in a way that makes something stir pleasantly in Clarke’s stomach. As much as Clarke wants to hear more about the particular shade that caused the spill of both words and coffee, the red tips of Lexa’s ears alone makes the disastrous state of Clarke’s tee worth it. “You know,” she teases, “there are easier ways to get me out of my shirt.”

“That’s not, I wasn’t—” Lexa flounders.

Smiling, Clarke muses, enjoying Lexa’s deepening flush far too much to let it go, “No other girl has ever made me this wet before. You’re going to ruin me for everyone else.”

“Ugh,” Lexa groans, peering through the gaps of fingers from the hand that has since covered her eyes.

Clarke laughs but then, pitying, peels her hand back and, in a brave move, interlocks their fingers to rest them on the table.

“Really, it’s ok. If this is my future, you in my space, I don’t mind,” she says softly.

The inevitability of the next run-in involving Clarke’s shirt reinforces the uselessness of fighting against fate’s grand plans.

Nothing of their usual friendly patter and nascent familiarity would indicate that four nights later Lexa would be pressing Clarke back against the front of her still-unlocked apartment door and panting heavily in her ear as two pairs of urgent hands paw away at clothes.

They had bumped into each other again in front of the café, though at the end of the day this time and less violently. A pleasant exchange somehow turned into an invitation for Lexa to come upstairs for her Peruvian fix. Wood St had closed early today for their monthly staff training, putting Lexa out from feeding her new caffeine addiction, having already missed her morning hit because of a meeting that ran late. Nothing to do with experiencing her own withdrawal from their cancelled rendezvous, Clarke just so happens to have stockpiles of the beans in her cupboard that she offered Lexa a home-brewed alternative.

Lexa initially declined though there was clear conflict in her show of restraint. She accepted in the end when Clarke pressed forward the need to return her growing collection of hard hats she’s unintentionally accruing. Another pressing need made itself known when Lexa smiled and gave Clarke the subtlest but most significant nod. Like crossing the threshold into Clarke’s building would mean something more than just beans.

The air prickled with anticipation on the elevator ride up while mindless chatter carried them down the hallway to Clarke’s unit. Butterflies made the short one hundred pace journey a nerve-wracking experience for Clarke as much as the ridiculous desire to hold Lexa’s hand should she get lost. But as they reached her door, on the fifth count that Clarke caught Lexa stealing a glance at her lips and the third time that Lexa’s arm brushed against her side while retelling an anecdote from the construction site, Clarke finally gave into her need for them to be touching.

Vibrating on the same wavelength, Lexa beat her to it.

The moment telegraphed itself in slow motion—the air stilling, an involuntary hand reaching up, shaky breath and lidded eyes fixing on Clarke’s mouth—before fast forwarding in a blur of singleminded intent as Lexa pulled her in by the hem of her shirt and her lips were met with the softest warmth, paired with an arousing whimper.

The unexpectedness of Lexa’s barrelling force nearly knocked Clarke off her feet. Swaying away at first, Clarke immediately returned the fervour in kind once she recovered from the surprise, something she’s gotten better at doing given the frequency of Lexa’s breaching. Their lips slid easily, hungrily against each other. She swallowed Lexa’s muffled apology for kissing without asking. Clarke hummed her consent. The utter _rush_ and rightness of having Lexa’s tongue in her mouth was an ineffable feeling only outmatched by the heady taste of her name breathed between them.

As first kisses go, it was both clumsy and cosmic. Beautiful in that contradiction of awkwardly meeting for the first time and finally arriving home.

This is how Clarke finds herself pinned against her door and at risk of openly having sex in the hallway if she can’t locate her key soon enough. This is how Clarke finds out Lexa kisses with her whole body. Searching and pawing for purchase, Lexa is grinding on her thigh and Clarke is closed to combusting with how long it’s been since there was someone between her legs.

She succeeds in pushing Lexa off long enough to prop the door ajar, but as soon as they slip through the open crack Lexa is on her again.

They kiss and kiss and Clarke can totally get used to this new type of non-Peruvian addiction. Lexa tastes earthy and sweet, an intoxicating combination especially layered with the scent of her shampoo, vanilla and elderberry. Just as Clarke’s faculties acclimatise to the various stimuli, fingers traverse the ridges of her rib cage under her sweater before a thumb sweeps over the swell of Clarke’s breast over the cup of her bra, adding to the sensory overload.

Changing kissing angles, Clarke gets a feel for tight abs when her hand’s blind search for stability—in reaction to an eager lick inside her mouth—lands on a taut stomach. She keens into the soft folds of Lexa’s lips as her fingers carve into the hard lines of her body.

_Jesus._

There’s little talking, just kissing. Dirty and devouring, like giving into something both of them have been mutually losing sleep over and, at least for Clarke, resulted in several cold showers ending with a hand below. Her fantasies about the way Lexa’s mouth would feel on her, _all over her_ , is nothing compared to the reality of it. Lexa is attentive in a way that Clarke’s imagination had not anticipated nor prepared for; how the give of her lips is as generous as the take of her tongue, which explores at length through alternating devotion between clinging warmth and toe-curling softness; how she kisses with the fullness of hands in a push and pull rhythm, action and ardour tied together to draw Clarke closer, spread heat across already burning skin, and narrow the outside world to the fire within.

Then, after an electric moment of searching gazes as they catch their breath, by mutual consent of nods and dilated pupils Lexa picks her up and spins them around so Clarke’s back hits against the door, closing it. Her legs wrap around Lexa’s waist on instinct. For someone so lithe, Lexa’s strength surprises her. Before the sound of Clarke’s guttural approval at the roughness can even form, Lexa’s hand moves down her stomach and dips into her joggers, fingers immediately sliding through soaked folds. Somewhere between fumbling and finesse, Lexa had managed to push Clarke’s underwear aside to fully access the result of their weeks-long foreplay.

_Double Jesus._

“Wait, wait, wait,” Clarke exclaims.

Lexa withdraws immediately, lowering Clarke down on her feet, rushing to back off and apologise. “I’m so sorry. Too fast? Oh god, did I read the signs wrong?”

Clarke doesn’t let her or her spiral get far, placing a placating hand on her forearm, stilling her retreat.

“No, you’re good. We’re good. I definitely want this,” she reassures, tipping her head up to kiss the underside of Lexa’s jaw. “It’s just, um, uh ...” Clarke hides her face in the crook of Lexa’s neck, embarrassed, and mumbles into her skin, “... I have a massive wedgie situation happening.”

“Oh. Oh!” Lexa laughs, understanding dawning. “Do you need help with it?” On Clarke’s shy nod, she reaches down again, then behind, fingers grazing Clarke’s backside, respectful despite their compromising position, and gingerly righting the material dislodged earlier by her hurried excitement.

Something of Lexa’s gentleness is incredibly hot. As much as their intensive kissing had ignited the slow burn between them, her slow care and soft touch is like setting kerosene on glowing embers.

“There,” Lexa says softly, “better?”

“Actually, you know what,” Clarke changes her mind, hands rushing to her waistband. “Take it off. I don’t need it. Underwear is overrated.”

Lexa happily gets with the programme. She helps pull down Clarke’s pants and panties together, with middling success. Neither of them put in more effort once the items fall past Clarke’s bum and pool at her spread knees. Clarke is quick to place Lexa’s hand back to where it was.

Just as Lexa prepares to move, the other hand fisting into the fabric of Clarke’s shirt to re-close their gap, Clarke interrupts. “Wait, one more thing.” Lexa obliges when Clarke gestures for to let go of the hem and hurries to lift her top over her head. “I really like this and would rather you not ruin it too.”

Lexa laughs again then defends, equally cheeky, “I’m still learning to handle hotness with care.”

“Tell that to my closet.”

Lexa harrumphs but lets the point slide. “Anything else?”

“Nope, we’re good.”

“Definitely,” Lexa notes with unmasked praise of Clarke’s newly exposed, bra-clad chest.

While pleased to have her approval up top, the stickiness below makes a complaint. Clarke pushes Lexa’s hand more firmly against her centre, giving the go ahead. Refocusing, on an experimental run through of the slickness, Lexa mewls in appreciation. Clarke moans in gratitude.

“You’re wet.”

“Yes.”

With no self-consciousness for acknowledging the obvious, her body reacts instantly as Lexa drags a knuckle through her wetness, more liquid heat descends when Lexa starts rubbing with greater intent using the pads of her fingers. It’s terrifyingly _not_ scary how Clarke readily accepts the loss of control—invites it even—and lets Lexa explore Clarke with as much care and curiosity as urgency will allow.

Lexa seems more and more pleased with what is discovered, movements encouraged by Clarke’s vocal reactions. She strokes and strokes for unmetered minutes, pulling moan after moan from Clarke only broken by plaintive cries that beggar for more. She switches between broad and tight circles, deliberately avoiding the bundle of nerves that throbs in impatient wait.

“Can I go in?” Lexa asks, breaths heavy against Clarke’s neck.

“ _Please_.”

Two fingers spread her lower lips open and then push inside. Air rushes from her chest.

A bite to Clarke’s shoulder communicates how equally affected Lexa is by the walls that close around her and pull her in deeper.

“So wet.”

“Are you always this observant?”

Clarke’s tease results in an admonishing bite but also the addition of a blissful third finger. Lexa’s form of retaliation is more reward than punishment. “And incredibly tight.”

From how Lexa has started stretching her, it doesn’t feel like it.

“Fuck,” Clarke pants, turning her head for a kiss that’s eagerly given to take off some of the edge from below. A consequential curl of Lexa’s fingers, however, undoes the effort, further tightening the coil in Clarke’s stomach. “Oh, Lex, right there.”

The shortened name injects renewed motivation into Lexa’s actions. Without preamble, she gets to work on dismantling Clarke three long and full fingers at a time. She fills Clarke up, empties out quickly, and just as swiftly refills. The slap of her palm hitting against Clarke’s front sends Clarke higher as she chases the intermittent friction.

After a barren winter, spring arrives with a gust of forest green when they lock gazes after one ruinous kiss is punctuated by well-timed contact made to her clit.

With the memory of her last orgasm so far out of reach, it’s no surprise how little it takes for her to climb towards release. Lexa intuitively senses her desperation and nearness, curls her fingers and hits Clarke’s inner wall with prescient accuracy. She pumps and pulls and thrusts against Clarke, while her other hand has made its way under Clarke’s bra and works a pattern of kneading her breast and rolling her nipple between thumb and forefinger.

With one hand gripping tightly onto the doorknob, anchoring, and the other groping what she can reach of Lexa’s ass inside her jeans, dipping into her wetness from behind, Clarke experiences one of the hottest, wettest, and rawest taking as Lexa bucks wildly into her. The door bangs loudly, she gives a fleeting thought of sympathy to her neighbours. Lexa’s movements are erratic, a mess of indecision from wanting to be everywhere at once, evidencing a comparably large gap since her last act of intimacy as well as a mutual lack of concern for how the noise of their coupling carries. The thirst with which they move against each other—primal and carnal—is telling of how long of a drought they’ve both similarly endured.

When air becomes critical, Lexa’s tongue moves on from kissing to licking and laving the column of Clarke’s throat before it returns to her mouth and starts sucking on its counterpart. A thumb rubs roughly on her clit that has Clarke pitching forward, nearly buckling if not for Lexa’s solid weight providing stability.

“Fuck, Clarke.” Lexa seems just as taken by the added stimulus. She rubs faster.

A silent scream later, Clarke orgasms hard. Lexa’s name is repeated over and over until she’s fucked into wordless pleasure.

There’s no recovery time before she’s coming again. Her joggers are discarded without further ceremony. Lexa is down on her knees the next second, hooking one of Clarke’s limp legs over her shoulder and then, on the signal of another consenting nod, the same wonderfully torturous tongue is inside of her, thick and filling, continuing to do more devastation than anything Clarke as ever felt with any past sexual partner. Lexa’s mouth seals around her drenched pussy as her tongue moves at an inhuman speed.

Clarke’s hands fly to her head, deathly hanging on as Lexa tongue-fucks her toward incoherence and a complete loss of spatial awareness.

So much so that by some contortionist magic, and no idea how, Lexa is lying on the couch and on her back and Clarke is riding her face at a maddening pace. It takes two tactical swirls of the tip of her tongue then Clarke is spilling.

“Holy fucking shit.”

Clarke lifts herself off, though her knees remain planted by the side of Lexa’s head. Her legs tremble from the effort to keep upright and not collapse. Looking down, a gorgeous sight greets her: Lexa’s lips and chin are shiny, the apples of her cheeks a deep rose, and her eyes the most verdant of forests—all framed by wild, auburn hair spread in every which direction.

“Can you go again?” Lexa asks, voice drenched in want. She meaningfully sucks on Clarke’s thumb after it wipes away spittle from the corner of her mouth.

As grateful as Clarke is for Lexa’s generosity, she worries that Lexa hasn’t come yet. “What about you?”

Clarke slides down her body, and through strategic tugs and lifts, helps to disrobe until they match in nakedness.

Their mouths meet at the same time that soft flesh come into contact, bodies aligning head to toe. Still holding hands, the kiss sends a shiver down Clarke’s spine, tingles skating the surface of her skin, radiating from her chest to her fingertips. They exchange moans for sighs.

They stay like that for awhile, Clarke on top, breast to breast and tongue to tongue, kissing and familiarising and exploring the relationship between action and reaction.

“I can multi-task,” Lexa answers belatedly when they finally pull away for air. Clarke isn’t sure of what she means until Lexa is guiding her to turn 180 degrees, lying on their sides and giving both their mouths equal access. It’s a tight squeeze on the sofa but it also leaves little space for complaint when Lexa’s intention becomes abundantly clear and she takes a long swipe through Clarke. “You taste amazing, I can’t get enough.”

The position is usually reserved for couples, or at least two people who’ve been intimate for longer than fifty, albeit shattering, minutes.

Yet, for how short they’ve known each other, Clarke has no hesitation at how their bodies are now entangled with the other, how they shift and make just enough room for electricity to alight across vibrating skin. It feels right. Indescribably so. The way they physically fit together is something Clarke has not experienced before but it is as if they have been doing this for ages. On her first taste of Lexa, she _knows_ it’s something she won’t be able to live without again.

This third go is slower and less urgent than the first two, but all the same, Lexa works Clarke’s body like she has long mastered it. They give and take once more, reciprocating each press and drag of tongue, each gentle and less-than-gentle kiss of lips to swollen lips and, when fingers simultaneously enter the other, each push and pull, until voices are hoarse from crying. They come together on twin sucking of clits and push of fingers. The almost soundless noise Lexa makes when she releases into Clarke’s mouth intensifies her own. Breathy and low and needy, its quiet timbre stirs something in Clarke, a sound she wants to hear again and again.

Months of pent up sexual frustration makes every sensation more acute, the heat wrapping around fingers and spilling on tongues is searing and intoxicating, each release more intense than the last and yet somehow still insufficient. It’s insatiable how much her body willingly, instinctually, opens up to, and for, Lexa.

They make it as far as the hallway for Clarke’s fourth and fifth orgasms, the bedroom for the sixth and seventh, and finally tap out after the eighth. Clarke can’t decide which has been her favourite position, bent over the back of her sofa, or on her hands and knees on her bed, ass in the air and pussy in Lexa’s mouth, or in adapted missionary form with every inch of skin pressed together while scissoring towards shared peaks. Lexa appears enthused to be wherever Clarke wants— _needs_ —her.

Clarke has never had this insane amount of sexual chemistry with anyone before and has done more with Lexa in one night than she has with multiple partners combined over years. The realisation should scare her but all she feels is contented soreness everywhere and especially concentrated between her legs.

This type of connection—instantaneous and intense and just plain incredible if not improbable—has been elusive for most of Clarke’s adult relationships so she hangs onto it, however fleeting it may be. The kissing alone is so hot that she’d be remiss to let the opportunity go, one that Lexa seems to be taking full advantage of at the moment as she slides their lips together again.

One hand in her hair cradling her head while the other palms her breast, Lexa kisses her breathless.

Clarke’s chest heaves under the weight of Lexa’s ardour, legs hooked by the ankle around her lower back, digging in encouragement. She is beyond spent but still can’t help canting her hips upwards into Lexa’s rocking motion, both lazily chasing the small aftershocks.

“You’re a really good kisser,” Lexa concludes when she finally relents and rolls off Clarke to lie by her side.

By unspoken collaboration Lexa lifts an arm and Clarke turns to nuzzle into her chest, fitting her head under Lexa’s chin like it’s something they’ve been doing forever. Lexa rubs an arm up and down her back.

“You’re alright,” Clarke jokes, her warm breath hitting the base of Lexa’s throat, which causes a shiver. “That was, um, _nice_.”

Lexa laughs at her economic summary. Light and airy, the sound of post-coital bliss. Peering down, Clarke sees her body littered with white crescents, purple moons and lipstick marks in the same shade that’s now faded from Lexa’s lips.

“It certainly was. I’ve been wanting to do it for awhile. It _has been_ awhile.”

Clarke hums agreement and closes her eyes, fatigue settling in, lulled to sleep by the evening rhythm of Lexa’s slowed breathing. Coffee, Peruvian or not, forgotten.

“A quick nap and I’ll get out of your hair,” Lexa mumbles into her bed head, her promise petering into a soft whisper.

“Ok,” Clarke says, burrowing deeper into their shared warmth and leaving several, last meaningful words between them, “Or, stay as long as you like.”

—

As long as Lexa likes, turns out to be as often as possible.

“I’d like to do this again sometime.”

It takes long minutes before Clarke registers the import of this set of words. Two weeks later and she feels as dazed from their activities as on the first night. Ever since their orgasm marathon, the running into each other has become a deliberate, regular thing as much as the coffee, bracketing her exhaustion-by-painting with exhaustion-by-panting.

“We’ve done it quite a few times already,” she tabulates, reminding of the frequency in the last hours alone, shuddering at the recent memory of bringing Lexa to orgasm just by nosing at her damp curls while Clarke fingered her. Lexa’s warbling cry still rings in her ears.

“I mean, more semi-permanently. An arrangement, of sorts.”

“Of sorts ...” Clarke drawls her parroted response, licking her fingers clean of Lexa and then sharing the taste with a deep kiss. “What kind of arrangement?”

“I like you, Clarke,” Lexa says, disarming and honest and butterflies-inducing.

“I like you, too.”

Lexa smiles hearing the affirmation. A second later, the look of relief at reciprocity turns contemplative. “And I like what we’ve been doing. I’d like nothing more than to keep doing you, but ...”

The butterflies quiet at the conjunction.

Putting on a playful smile, Clarke purposefully obfuscates Lexa’s meaning by squeezing her generous rear, dragging out the word, “ _But_ you don’t think we’re at that stage of our relationship yet to be knocking on the back door?”

Rather than a banter to Clarke’s joke, she receives a tighter smile. The ’r’ word pulls a reaction from Lexa, although the odd look passes as quickly as it comes. Changing tact, Lexa pivots the conversation to their demanding day jobs, “We’re both extremely busy, working in stressful environments with stressful deadlines,” trying to convince Clarke of an answer to a yet undisclosed question. “Would you be open to ...”

Lexa trails off again, letting out nervous laughter before launching into another one of her rambles.

Not privy to its reasoning or exact direction, Clarke listens patiently as Lexa flusters through her speech. Something about pent up energy, about efficiency and enjoying the feel of Clarke under her. Much of it is a stream of consciousness of which Lexa is likely unaware she’s turned the tap on. Normally composed, this flappable performance endears Lexa further to Clarke. A ‘yes’ is at the tip of her tongue before Lexa even asks, whatever the request may be and especially if it extends the conditions of their fortnight of intensely physical acquaintance. By coffee or corporeal means, Clarke’s appetite for more of Lexa yawns wide and deep.

It’s why her heart drops a little—a lot—when she tunes back in.

“... _but_ , it can’t be more than this,” Lexa says slowly, looking at her careful and cautious. The fingers stroking the curve of Clarke’s hips, still.

“More than what?”

“ _This_.”

Lexa repeats the word, no clearer, rather, placing emphasis this time by trailing her fingers up Clarke’s side, over the swell of her breast, then bending her head down to gently suck. While Lexa’s mouth works her nipple to a firmness, her hips start to grind deliberate circles as Lexa’s fingers find their way inside of Clarke again.

The _this_ could be a number of things. How Clarke makes _this_ sound as Lexa slips in and out; how her heart flips _this_ way and that at Lexa’s answering moan on her breast; how Clarke’s legs fall open wider while her head falls back against the pillow and her hands scramble for hold in Lexa’s hair as whatever _this_ is picks up pace; how Lexa moves to kiss her when Clarke is coming and _this_ feeling of being so completely undone within mere minutes.

It’s as clear as the arousal dripping down her inner thigh, what _this_ means.

Sex.

Lexa runs her hand through sweaty, tangled hair to reference the exact activity. Clarke knows what Lexa is implying but probes anyway, panting for air after tucking into Lexa’s chest. “What do you mean?”

“I have someone.” _That_ , she did not expect. Hearing the equivalent of a cold shower, Clarke recoils at the admission but Lexa is quick to correct, “ _Had_ someone. Sort of.”

“How do you _sort of_ have someone? We can’t sorta be doing this if you sorta have someone.”

Heart suddenly in her throat, Clarke is scrambling to put distance between their bodies but Lexa pulls her back in, “Sorry, poor choice of words, it’s not what it sounds like,” kissing her forehead in appeasement. A hand resettles on Clarke’s hip, gripping more securely, pleadingly, to keep her in place. “We’re not together, or rather, we’re on a break.”

“Ross and Rachel kind of break or _break_ break?”

“Real break, break,” Lexa replies, then, chewing on her bottom lip, tacks on, “but with an expiry date.” The footnote intrigues Clarke enough to hear her out, quirking an eyebrow to urge her to continue. “Her name’s Costia.”

Lexa relays the situation with her (sort of) girlfriend of three years and how they have mutually decided to press the pause button on their relationship because of Lexa’s overseas project. A pact to take the distance as an opportunity to reassess before taking the next logical step forward. Lexa doesn’t say the actual word but the meaning is clear by the way she plays with her left ring finger. Marriage.

“Did you know that the average amount of time for a long distance relationship to break up if it’s not going to work is 4.5 months? And that, the total percent of LDR that break up is 40?”

“Not a rosy picture,” Clarke surmises.

Lexa nods.

“Neither of us was keen to be a statistic but she also didn’t want me to pass up the career opportunity and I didn’t want to put her through waiting. So, we decided together to take some time for ourselves. Test the waters of being apart, live guilt-free separately, and be sure of each other before coming back together. Ditching before hitching, Cos calls it.”

“That’s ... novel,” Clarke says hesitant, with some skepticism about this version of ‘try before you buy.’

Lexa reads her unvoiced thought.

“I know, an open relationship probably sounds like a setup for failure,” Lexa acknowledges, then goes quiet for some minutes. Clarke gives her time to gather herself. Again, Lexa surprises her with her honesty. “We hit a bit of a speed bump last year. Things have been ...” Clarke holds her breath for how the sentence will end but it doesn’t. Instead, Lexa admits, “We haven’t been physical in a long time.”

Clarke nods, absorbs the info while questioning the wisdom of couples sex therapy involving other people.

“I’m not sure why or how we got to where we did,” Lexa continues softly, no longer making eye contact, instead playing with the fold in the bedsheet between them and sounding rueful, “I still want to try with her.”

“I get it,” Clarke says, offering a kind, though small, smile. And she does, having tried for years with Niylah, even if the fit never turned out right no matter how much they wanted it to work, she can understand not wanting to give up.

Nonetheless, Clarke internally shrinks at Lexa’s confession. She has no claim to Lexa but can’t help the minor pull of her heart to not be a part of what Lexa wants. Lexa’s finishing thought, however, takes the sting out of it, “We’ve never connected physically the way you and I have.”

It’s said quietly and more as a realisation to herself than meant aloud but Clarke stores the tidbit away, if only to justify what she might be potentially getting into. (That the tinge of awe in Lexa’s voice is a boost to her ego may also be a factor, she locks for safekeeping.)

“And she’d be okay with how we’ve been, uh, _connecting_?”

“Yeah, we talked about it before I left and, um, I’ve mentioned you during our FaceTime.”

Clarke’s eyes bulge.

“No details,” Lexa soothes her worry. “Costia knows of your existence in the general abstract.”

“That’s ...” Clarke doesn’t want to say _novel_ again, but can’t find a better word.

Not registering Clarke’s mini linguistic crisis, Lexa divulges, “She’s started seeing someone, too.” _Is that what we’re doing, seeing each other?_ Clarke wonders. “We talked about keeping things open and flexible. To explore with other people. No details, no jealousy. Then, no matter what happens, come back together at the end of my contract, talk, and go from there.”

“So ... what is this for you? What am I to you?”

It has only been a little over two weeks of intimately _knowing_ each other that really amounts to less than twenty-four hours of condensed time together, and far too soon to have such a ‘what are we’ conversation, but Clarke needs the clarity after the haziness of too many orgasms.

“You’re my six months.”

She can’t help the flutter the words cause in her stomach, which inexplicably swoops at being Lexa’s anything.

“Casual, simple. Just sex.”

“Just sex,” Clarke repeats, overturning the words in her mouth as she mulls Lexa’s proposition.

“ _Really good_ sex.“

That’s a fact that hits squarely between Clarke’s legs and hard to contest. There’s no denying what’s plain in front of her, nothing to contradict the second heart beat that’s still throbbing.

Presented with a fork in the road of good decision-making, the left side of her brain is sending rapid fire, flare signals to choose the safer path—to not be the third wheel to an undefined twosome. The right side of her brain, riding the high of a massive serotonin hit, makes a compelling case to ignore its counterpart.

A sparrow had landed on her window sill in the very week that Lexa landed in her borough, a coincidence that Clarke has yet to fully make sense but, as an artist who wields in metaphors and imagery, she had let the intangible tug of the songbird’s call, much like Lexa’s, pull her towards her canvas. Clarke hasn’t stopped painting since both of their arrival, highly attuned to their peculiar auditory signals. Hearing Lexa’s panting cries in her ear with continuing regularity shouldn’t be, but has been, really, _really_ good for her productivity. In the name of art, Clarke reasons, is sound argument for swinging the pendulum strongly in the bad decisions favour.

“Can we kiss,” Clarke asks, testing the waters, “or are we wading into Pretty Woman territory?”

Lexa laughs but answers her by leaning forward and kissing Clarke long and slow. Clarke rolls on top to lessen the awkward angle with how they had been lying on their sides. The travel of tingles through her entire being accelerates with the added pressure of Lexa’s tongue.

“Yes. I’m not a monster.”

“What about coffee?” Clarke asks after pulling back, adjusting her straddle into more of a sitting position using Lexa’s stomach as her cushion.

“As long as it’s Peruvian, of course.”

“Of course. Cuddles?”

“Yes, absolutely. Encouraged. Necessary even.”

“Sleepovers?”

“Sure, why not.” Lexa shrugs, smiling. Clarke’s eyebrows react to the non-cliché, atypical-ness of Lexa’s version of a no strings attached arrangement, which she explains with uncanny, _left-brain_ , rationality. “Our diaries don’t exactly align, you paint at night and I get up early to run before I have to report to site. There’s bound to be an overlap in schedule with how enthusiastic you are about all _this_ ,” Lexa teases and gestures meaningfully below her waist as Clarke mindlessly trails fingers over Lexa’s flexed abdomen. Clarke doesn’t bother to refute. “I hope you won’t kick me out of your bed when enthusiasm inevitably bleeds into the morning.”

“You run?” Clarke asks to buy herself time to consider, exaggerating judgment and feigning disgust in her voice at the concept of voluntary exercise. The thought of rising at ungodly hours for something as self-flagellating as _cardio_ sounds like punishment.

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because.” Lexa follows up her reply with one swooping move that puts Clarke on her back and pressed into the mattress. Clarke’s surprised yelp is sidelined by Lexa’s smugness. “Lower body strength.”

“Point taken,” Clarke concedes the merit of unnecessary physical exertion, content for the solid weight pinning her down. “So, maybe sleepovers. What else? What’s a no for you?”

“Complication.”

“No complication?”

Lexa shakes her head. “No feelings, no messy emotions. No attachments. Nothing complicated.”

It sounds already complicated, like a recipe for a multi-layered complication soufflé, but Clarke humours this particular cliché and pokes fun, “I don’t know, what you were doing with your tongue earlier _felt_ pretty, intensely complicated. I also feel deeply attached to your fingers. How will you part with that kind of emotional responsibility?”

“I think I can find a way. I _am_ more than capable of separating feelings from duty,” Lexa plays along by sweeping Clarke into a kiss that is purposefully reckless, and for all intents, the opposite of obligation. She nips at Clarke’s upper lip before licking into her mouth again. ”See? Nothing. Like kissing my grandma.”

Clarke actually doesn’t see because her eyes are still closed trying to regulate her breathing and heart rate. “God, I hope not,” she answers anyway. “That’s not how I greet mine.”

“If there’s ever a hint of more than this,” Lexa continues, tracing Clarke’s jaw from one end to the other with her lips before mouthing into the hollow of her neck, “more than friendship,” causing a hitch of breath, “or some kind of affection other than your fondness for my fingers,” and another hitch as her pulse point is paid extended attention and those same fingers skate down her chest, “we end our arrangement.”

“Because you have someone waiting.”

“Yeah.”

It’s the first affirmative that Lexa says with a measurable note of hesitation, which Clarke feels in the vibration of a stuttered breath against her skin. She empathises with the sentiment, isn’t as keen about this ‘yes’ as the last ones. Rather than dwell, she circles back, “We’re friends?”

“Aren’t we?”

“I’m not sure how many of my friends I French kiss, down _there_.” Clarke shudders at the thought of locking lips with either Octavia or Raven, north or south. “I’m starting to question your history with kissing, Woods.”

“Consider it friends with intimate, _liquid_ benefits,” Lexa contends, trailing the path of a bead of sweat running over the exposed top swell of Clarke’s breast with the pad of her forefinger. The movement spikes low in Clarke’s stomach, striking the match of arousal yet again. “A nice swim between two drops in the ocean whose ripples meet in the middle.”

Kissing, cuddling, fucking, sleeping over but no feeling. _How difficult can it be?_ Clarke wonders as desire returns full force and minimises her ability to ignore the self-fulfilling prophecy and the all but guaranteed disastrous outcome of treading into uncharted water.

“Everything but love,” Lexa offers, a renewed confidence in her voice that is only betrayed by the biting of her bottom lip. “What do you say? Six months of making each other feel good. _Great_. Nothing else.”

Because Clarke’s heart is still hammering from the feel of Lexa moving against her, _inside_ her, and because the smile on Lexa’s face is bottled moonlight and the expectant but hopeful look in her eyes could build Rome in a day, Clarke ignores all warning bells. Historically and obstinately, she has an impulse to want what she can’t have.

Clarke nods.

“As soon as it gets more complicated than that ...”

“... we get out,” Lexa finishes, reassuring with a playful glint in her eye, “If it complicates, we extricate.” Her rhyme and waggle of eyebrow make Clarke laugh, eases the tension. “Simple.”

“I _suppose_ I wouldn’t be _opposed_ ,” Clarke submits and then surprises them both when she manages to straddle Lexa and reverse their position. Lexa’s hands immediately go to her hips, helping her start a grinding motion against her abs. Running fingers from sternum to stomach while rocking, Clarke finishes, “to more of this kind of simplicity.”

Lexa’s expression brightens as she sits up to pull Clarke’s shirt over her head that they’d been too eager earlier to rid of. The loss of coverage is immediately compensated by exploratory hands, cupping and massaging. “Super simple,” Lexa’s hungry gaze promises as a thumb circles one pebbled nipple while the other contents to continue stroking under the curve of Clarke’s breast. She asks softly, “Feel good?”

Clarke arches into the light pressure, a whine serving as her response. It turns into an appreciative moan when Lexa’s hand travels below, applying the same care to the wetness found there. They gasp in unison. Lexa stiffens her palm and positions her fingers, on which Clarke immediately sinks down and rides.

 _Fuck_. They both expel when Clarke’s heat envelops Lexa.

Panting, “Should we shake on it?” Clarke asks, despite the preoccupation and current, better, use of Lexa’s hand.

“No,” Lexa replies, then after a few decisive pumps, flips them over yet again. “I prefer verbal agreements,” she counters while moving down Clarke’s body with clear intent. Clarke is still a step behind, disoriented from losing track of who’s on top, but the delayed vocalisation of disapproval about the withdrawn fingers dies in her throat when Lexa swipes through her.

“Yup, definitely verbal,” Clarke agrees an embarrassing ninety seconds later, patting Lexa on the head in congratulations, her desire spent quickly and easily. Given her non-existent stamina, maybe there is something to making a habit of doing cardio. Lexa’s chin shines exceedingly proud for her liking but Clarke can’t deny the appeal of regular, on demand stress relief, how she’d prefer to train. It has her finally accepting her fate and vowing while catching her breath, “Ok, as long as you can keep making me come like _this_ and promise not to fall in love with me, which, good luck resisting, we can give it a try.”

“You drive a hard bargain but, I promise, deal,” Lexa says, laughing at the tables turned on her scheme, smile reaching her eyes. She kisses the inside of Clarke’s thigh to clean her mouth and emerges to say, “I’ll even throw in free coffee and bonus orgasms.”

The way the light slants through Clarke’s bedroom window and frames Lexa in silhouette, it steals the breath from already taxed lungs. Completely opposite to what she’d just sworn Lexa not to do, the vision ignites a warmth that feels a lot more than _like_ , more than just the heat between Clarke’s legs.

Later, Clarke will look back and know this was the precise moment when realisation comes that some promises are meant to be broken. Looking into Lexa’s eyes, she sees the specific hour when she understands how tenderness could be a colour.

Something of the charged moment must pull at Lexa as well because she kisses her, fully and with none of the terms and conditions. It seals their contract and quells whatever uncertainty remains between them.

“Deal.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading :) Next chapter will test just how 'novel' their arrangement is. I'll give you a thousand guesses, will Lexa break her promise?


	2. of heights and hopes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is best summarised by a note I received on Tumblr about the last chapter: "Lexa not wanting any feelings involved but also wanting all the cuddles lmao." In that vein, here, have 19k of just ... exactly this ... ❌ feelings ✅ cuddles (+ a smidgen of anal)
> 
> Written to Sam Smith's Say It First.

_Come on baby, say it first  
I need to hear you, say those words  
If I'm all that you desire,  
_ _I promise there'll be fire  
I need to hear you, say it first  
Come on baby_

_***_

_— IV. The cranes —_

Clarke should have known better, that she would be doomed from day one. The contract gets thoroughly signed by making each other come twice more and Lexa very late (again) for her contractor meeting. With the ink barely dried on their no strings arrangement, the trouble starts. Clarke’s phone dings. Because it’s only been minutes since the door closed, she assumes the follow-up text is about a forgotten item left behind in Lexa’s hurried exit.

Clarke smiles seeing the name on screen, which she hadn’t bothered to change from when they first exchanged numbers.

 _(Kelly):_ Many thanks ...

The politeness has her grinning, the deliberate dot dot dot has her intrigued. Her body’s pleasant soreness is clue enough of the cause for Lexa’s gratefulness, but the hanging ellipse invites coyness.

 _(Clarke):_ ... for?

Oddly, a reply doesn’t come. Not right away. Half an hour later, Clarke’s signature is put to real use, signing for a bouquet of flowers housing a note card that reads in cursive penmanship, _... for the sex._

Laughter blooms from her lips at the dozen of blooming colours, a burst of blues and violets, transferred to her hold by the delivery boy. Clarke sends him off with a generous tip that’s only outsized by her smile.

What is lacking in Lexa’s subtlety is made up by the delicate and translucent petals, a thin softness under Clarke’s touch. Once the flowers are put in water, she hastens to her loft’s window that overlooks the construction site, hoping to catch a glimpse of the part-time florist. In a landscape of white hard hats, it’s easy to spot Lexa’s black one. Clarke types out a text response and watches as Lexa fishes her phone out from her back pocket.

 _(Clarke):_ Tulips, really?

It’s difficult to know for sure from this many storeys high but Clarke swears she can see Lexa smiling as her thumbs fly across the keyboard.

 _(Kelly):_ I’m growing fond of yours. Wanted to express my gratitude.

Lexa’s head turns up towards her building, her gaze scanning in Clarke’s general direction as if she too is trying to erase seven storeys of distance between them.

Clarke shakes her head at the terrible pun, though charmed nonetheless, failing to resist its, and the messenger’s, pull. Her teeth sink into the very subject of Lexa’s newfound fondness while the other pair throbs pleasantly in memory of both sets of lips being keenly, and thoroughly, explored.

 _(Clarke):_ Thank you. They’re beautiful.

Even as her chest expands at the gesture, arguably romantic whether intended as such, Clarke convinces herself that friendship flowers between two people sleeping together are a thing. Friendship plus sex, easy. Simple. She can do this.

A pattern begins, involving a lot of doing. Lexa comes over twice a week, each day that she’s on site, right after her shift ends. Morning caffeine transitions into evening comfort.

Clarke is waiting with coffee and croissants. They chat about the condo’s development, trading stories and perspectives; Clarke high up, Lexa on the ground. Littered among progress reports of the building and discussions about Clarke’s painting, they also get to know each other in other departments.

Lexa did her undergrad at Columbia and Clarke at Parsons. They ruminate about whether they had ever been on the same A train in and out of Brooklyn in a sliding doors situation or ever grabbed fries from the same vendor at the same time. In a city of over eight million people, implausible as is, more of their paths may have crossed than known. Clarke wonders what an alternate universe would be like where she had met Lexa earlier in life, possibly as kids who grew up together and were each other’s one and done. It’s tempting to think how paths diverge and where and how they re-converge. As her nights progressively fill with laughter and happy banter, the artist and part-time philosopher in her wonders if this is an instance of two lines finding their way back to one another, after starting in different directions on the same page.

Inevitably, there’s a lull in conversation in the evening as the gap between them on the couch closes, gazes lingering longer on lips, and hands wandering farther up bare skin. There’s a pretence of a shower for Lexa to wash off the day’s grime that usually ends up a water-saving endeavour for two. Clothes come off. Distances completely erase.

Standing now under the rain shower, grinding against Lexa’s thigh as they kiss with the same intensity as the jet stream, Clarke is thankful for the added features of her bathroom, which doubles as a steam room. The glass is foggy with the evidence of their pre-bedroom efforts.

“Lexa, inside,” Clarke gasps between strokes of Lexa’s tongue. “Fuck, inside, please.”

Heeding instructions, Lexa picks her up, hooking Clarke’s legs around her back, and proceeds to do just that against the tiled wall. Somewhere between lifting her and sucking on the pulse point of her throat, Lexa slips inside Clarke without her notice. The fullness of attentive fingers makes their presence known when they twist on leave, wrenching a garbled, watered cry from her.

Lexa works her up until Clarke’s wetness becomes indistinguishable from the run of water. As it has become routine, things escalate quickly from there. But it’s not the way that Lexa thrusts into her unrelenting and unrestrained that leads to her dismantling; it’s how her mouth fits against Clarke’s, slanted at a perfect angle to both trace and receive, and the pull of tiny whimpers each micro movement of tongue earns, that sends Clarke reeling. It’s the taste of Lexa’s want, hot and heavy and drenched in need, that can fell the mountains Clarke’s heart climbs nightly.

It should be worrisome how hard and fast they have fallen into this rhythm. Into each other. It should concern her the haste with which she craves Lexa’s touch and the swiftness with which it builds her up and brings her crashing down.

When Clarke returns from her momentary flight, promises are writ large in Lexa’s kisses that can be no more permanent than the rivulets glistening over smooth, bronze skin; promises that will fade when bruises do. But if there is trouble audible in the tremor of her release or the quickening of an erratic pulse, it deafens in the echoing space of glass and ceramic as Lexa’s moans reverberate against Clarke’s chest, as her nails scratch half moons into Clarke’s back when Clarke returns the favour. The cacophonous mixing of their cries drown out all worries as much as the rain shower washes away evidence of vows that may never be.

Depending on the day’s labour, the rest of the night will oscillate between varying intensities of silence and noise, extended durations of reverberant touches, and shifting flows of want and need. Between aural exclamations and visible markings, they learn the landscape of each other’s bodies, where a valley dips and a curve swells, what sensitive expanse causes a hitch or ushers forth a gasp, which rhythmic and resonant movements lead to discovery of unmapped geographies.

The vibrations and echoes at night—in the bedroom, between the corridor walls, on the couch, atop the kitchen counter, or here underneath the shower’s acoustics—become the new soundtrack punctuating the end of long days as the noise of construction activity fades to the background. A sonic love rising that goes unheard despite its quiver in eardrums, given no voice save for the two straining to articulate ‘more’ and ‘please’ past coursing pleasure.

The humming and buzzing of bodies making contact, repeatedly and with staccato verve, the volume rising from a murmur to a roar.

“You’re incredible.” Lexa exhales in awe after they finally make it to the bed and emerge trembling from another go. “The way you clench around my fingers is unbelievably hot.” Clarke hides her blush against Lexa’s chest, cheeks burning, but it’s the next pronouncement that feeds the fire in her own chest. “God, I never want to leave.”

They fall asleep shortly thereafter with Lexa’s fingers still inside her, Clarke’s walls not willing to let go with how good and full they feel. Eventually an hour later, they do part but the ghost of Lexa’s presence stays, and unbeknownst to a groggy Clarke, gives form to the thought, _I never want you to either_.

With uncontested expediency, they become inseparable. The sex more intense and intimate by the first month’s end. Their physical bond reaches a level of unprecedented closeness by the second, quick and rough traded in for slow and soft. For stretches of time to explore every inch of skin and memorise the differences in sound each studious examination elicit. For her creativity to flourish underneath the ichorous light of Lexa’s attention. For Clarke’s day to be dipped in yellow ochre stretching time across her canvas until she can spend the evening in Lexa’s arms, surrounded by the incandescent glow of an unnameable _something_. For Clarke to acknowledge, very early on, she is supremely screwed in more ways than one.

The attachment of the no strings attached becomes apparent, and undeniable, when both have to shorten their standing Wednesday night for separate dinners, Clarke with her best friend and Lexa with her sister.

Stood behind Lexa as she helps to zip up the back of her dress, Clarke fights the urge to reverse its direction of travel and drag Lexa back to bed where they had only gotten to round one of what would normally be three or four at minimum. Instead, she kisses the bare skin of Lexa’s shoulder, whispering “all done,” as soft as her press of lips. She allows her mouth to stay longer than it should next to the strap of the black cocktail number that hugs Lexa’s hips in a way that makes Clarke want to cancel her plans and join their bodies until rounds nine and ten.

Lexa turns. “Thank you.”

She cuts such an attractive figure Clarke has to restrain her hands behind her back from wanting to reach out and kiss her breathless.

“Come here, let me,” Clarke offers seeing Lexa reach for her makeup kit.

She gently pushes her down by the shoulder to sit at the edge of Clarke’s bed. Lifting Lexa’s chin, a gentle hold between thumb and forefinger, Clarke takes over the mascara in her hand, fighting the urge to get loss in the eyes that stare up and in the sweep of Lexa’s eyelashes that don’t really need help making a statement.

“Thanks for letting me get ready here. It would’ve been a nightmare to double-back across town to my apartment then the restaurant.”

Even if the venue was not within walking distance from Clarke’s place, she would have welcomed any excuse to stretch their minutes together.

Clarke hums she’s listening while maintaining focus on her task. With the practised ease of handling a brush, she lengthens and thickens, aware of the faint hitches of breath when her own fans across the target of her movements.

There’s a moment of pause where Clarke imagines what the black pigment would look like spread all around Lexa’s eyes, the kohl running down her cheeks like a modern day warrior ready for battle. Her hand itches for charcoal to put the image to paper.

“Anya has a new bird obsession. I think,” Lexa fills in the quiet, stilling under Clarke’s study. “At least that’s what I gathered from her low level threat that I better show up to some aviary discourse. My sister is not very verbal and generally above the whole human communication thing so I didn’t get much else.”

“Rey’s the opposite. She hasn’t shut up about her new girlfriend whom she’s adamant will be her future wife.”

“When you know, you know.”

Clarke actually doesn’t know. She has not felt that pull towards anyone other than Lexa who is, as her luck would have it, too emotionally unavailable to be an option. Her stomach dips unpleasantly at the next thought but Clarke can’t help asking anyway, “Is that what it was like with Costia? You just knew?”

She has no claim to be jealous, yet, the question feels like coarse salt making its way out of Clarke’s throat. Expecting and also dreading Lexa’s affirmative answer, Clarke is surprised to not find ready agreement. Instead, Lexa is gazing deeply into her eyes like she’s trying to read the tea leaves of this chat and, something else indecipherable, like an attempt to determine whether the composition of the universe is in the dust of freckles on Clarke’s pinkening cheeks. Lexa doesn’t verbalise her thoughts in the end, and Clarke doesn’t know if she’s relieved or disappointed to have it unconfirmed that Lexa has already experienced that knowing with someone else.

Lexa smiles, though it doesn’t quite reach the corner of her eyes. She sidesteps the land mine. “What I _do know_ is Anya will have some loud silence for me if I’m late. I’m meeting her at the metro first. I better get going.”

“Me too.” A final brush, Clarke wraps up and Lexa thanks her while completing the rest of her routine. Feeling suddenly vulnerable and uncharacteristically needy, Clarke asks, tentative, “Will I see you after?”

Lexa has one shoe on and finishes slotting her heel into the other before turning back to Clarke. That curious look again. “If you want.”

“I do.”

With Clarke still flat footed and Lexa three inches taller than usual, Clarke has to crane her neck up on Lexa’s advance. Warm hands cup her face, thumbs brushing gently against her cheeks before joining their mouths together. Clarke sighs into the slow kiss, melts into Lexa’s softness, and nips at pump lips to seek reassurance which a receptive tongue is happy to provide.

“I’ll text you afterwards then,” Lexa whispers. Neither of them call attention to the kiss she leaves on Clarke’s forehead that’s more intimate and tender than expected of fuck buddies.

“Please.”

They hold still for several skipped heart beats, something fragile passing between them, before Lexa departs with a smile that does reach her eyes this time.

“See you later.”

Later turns out not to be three hours but thirty minutes. Perhaps the surprise would have been less had Clarke paid more attention earlier to the name of Lexa’s destination, rather than being caught up in the curl and lift of her eyelashes.

Clarke is shown to the table in the Nepalese restaurant where Raven is already waiting. The best friends catch up on the week’s gossip, Clarke deflecting about how she’s spending her time besides painting, and Raven raving about her new girlfriend, a property lawyer with supposedly killer cheekbones. Naturally, at the mention of real estate and buildings, Clarke’s thoughts drift to her architect and how their parting kiss is a prelude to their nightcap and a promise of what’s in store. An unchecked smile radiates across her face that, fortunately, an enamoured Raven is too distracted to read further into.

As fate would have it, Clarke’s imagination materialises in front of her eyes. At the same time that she notices a strikingly familiar figure approaching them, Raven’s face breaks into a broad smile as she gets up from her seat to greet their guests. Clarke is still several steps behind to realise that others would be joining their meal, shocked at finding Lexa standing next to a statuesque, blonde version of herself. The trio exchange introductions and pleasantries, Raven shaking Lexa’s hand while placing an overly familiar kiss to the other woman’s cheek.

“Lexa?” Clarke gapes.

“Wait, you know each other?” Raven asks, at once confused and weirdly gleeful.

“Yes,” Clarke answers simultaneously as Lexa denies, “No.”

Before she can be hurt by the apparent denial of their acquaintance, Clarke’s relieved to see Lexa’s comment isn’t in response to Raven. She’s instead throwing daggers at Raven’s date who stares back at Lexa in silent challenge, a matched eyebrow raised, patiently waiting for the scene to play out and managing to look amused and disinterested in equal measure.

“Anya,” Lexa warns in a pleading, familial tone, against what, Clarke doesn’t know.

“Anya?” Clarke directs the question at Lexa while the very person at the centre of her confusion subtly turns to not-so-subtly take Clarke in.

Clarke drags her gaze away from Lexa, gulps at drawing a pair of intense brown eyes. She turns to her friend for answers about their two degrees of separation. “Raven?”

“Si, yo soy Raven,” Raven unhelpfully confirms, intentionally misinterpreting Clarke’s prompt but gives up the pretence when Clarke elbows her hard. “Ow! Fine. This is Anya and her sister Lexa, whom you may or may not know. Whom I may or may not have mentioned will be joining us for dinner because I was hoping to set you up without your usual objections about getting laid on your own terms. How sneaky of me.” She performs her maestro duties with signature sass, controversial matchmaking attempt notwithstanding. “Anya, Lexa, this is Clarke, my best friend, who up until a minute ago, before a pretty girl walked in, was a fully functioning human.”

Ignoring Raven’s last comment, Clarke shakes hands with Anya while Lexa shifts uncomfortably on her feet and newly addresses her pleading look to Clarke.

Seeing Lexa mildly distraught, Clarke has the urge to run her knuckles over the back of Lexa’s hand, a soothing motion that usually calms her through her coming down. But given their audience and the peculiarity of the situation, she lets Lexa ride out the discomfort, quirking an eyebrow in coded question that Lexa is quick to shake her head a secret reply, _later_. The fleeting, shared look nonetheless catches Raven’s nosy gaze.

“Wait, you _do_ know each other?”

At her statement-as-question, there’s a drawn out silence that falls between the quartet as Clarke and Lexa continue their nonverbal communication and Raven’s brows furrow in deeper suspicion, until Anya breaks the silence. “I didn’t know it was possible to die from anticipation.”

Her deadpan earns a further glare from Lexa but does work to end the stalemate. As they take their seats at Raven’s encouragement, Clarke catches Lexa’s snippy remark to her sister. “Anh, don’t.” There’s an unspoken, “Please be nice,” in her tone.

“Clarke and I do know one another. We bumped into each other on my construction site,“ Lexa says once they’re settled in, keeping the circumstance of their meeting vague. “It’s nice to see you again, Ms Griffin.”

“Really, Lexa?” Anya challenges, like she doesn’t believe for one second that they’re practically strangers. It’s circumspect enough that Lexa’s gaze softens when she gives Clarke a conspiratorial, poorly hidden wink, as if fully aware and fully enjoying gaslighting her sister.

It’s an oddity to see this playful Lexa, a public version of the girl in Clarke’s bed an hour earlier.

“You too, Ms Woods,” Clarke enunciates purposefully, mirroring the forced formality and holding back her laughter at the sisters’ stare-off. “It’s happened more than once now,” she informs the other two without taking her eyes off Lexa as she tests the boundaries of their collaborative make belief, “You could say we’re bumping buddies.”

A rush of blood races up Lexa’s neck to her face. While the waiter’s arrival distracts Raven and Anya to double the drink order already on the table, Lexa leans in to let Clarke know she owes her a story and would be grateful if Clarke played along for now. Clarke agrees to the subterfuge, reassured by the squeeze of Lexa’s hand to her thigh under the table that there’s a perfectly good reason for the distancing of their familiarity. Patting her hand, she parks her questions for the time being.

“Anya mentioned you’re an architect. Your site must be in Brooklyn then,” Raven comments after the waiter leaves, “because Clarke doesn’t leave her studio for anything but the coffee downstairs when she’s in a painting spell.”

“Yes, Clarke’s introduced me to my new favourite way to wake up.”

“Something like that,” Clarke chips in, continuing the charade but also not missing the twinkle in Lexa’s eyes that communicates more truth to it than a caffeine kick. “Wood’s definitely has its perks.”

Another soft touch to her thigh grabs her attention while Raven goes off on some tangential anecdote about stinky college Clarke who forgot the concept of bathing during final project hand-in and was the opposite of perky. The warmth above her knee is like kindle to the still lingering heat from their earlier activity, it sparks a showreel of very un-stranger-like things she and Lexa have been doing to each other. Lexa massages, a comforting stroke pattern that is more intimate than sexual but nonetheless makes Clarke reach for her beer. She refocuses on the conversation at hand where Raven seems completely head over heels for Anya, whose discerning glances her way lets Clarke know she and Lexa are not fooling anyone about what’s happening under the table cloth.

Regardless, they mutually commit to their respective roles of supportive friend and sister. Clarke learns more about Lexa through Anya’s teasing, delights in Lexa’s unsuccessful attempts to shut her up.

Clarke joins in on the fun too.

“So, Lexa, what do you do to unwind after work?”

With the light ribbing in all directions across the table and the light rubbing underneath exclusive to Clarke, the dinner turns out as pleasant as the minor buzz she sports by the time dessert arrives.

There’s a natural chemistry between all of them, feeding well off of their contradictory but complementary personalities. Raven’s crass versus Anya’s dry, sardonic humour; Lexa’s understated wit paired with Clarke’s open teasing. Over momos, thali combos, and an assortment of fragrant Himalayan flavours, and fuelled by the overflow of imported Kingfisher beer, they share an evening of stories and curry-stained smiles.

Half the meal is spent with Clarke fighting off Raven’s suggestive nudges to ask Lexa out whenever she thinks the sisters aren’t listening, the other half pretending like she’s not playing footsies with Lexa, all the while trying not to earn the ire of Anya whose calculating gaze could cut through the yak butter. It’s a balancing act of the walking on a fishing line variety but Clarke feels fortunate nevertheless for a Friday night like this.

Their time ends on a glutton of small milk cakes, the Peda absorbing the alcohol consumption. Clarke gravitates especially to the chocolate truffle stuffed coconut laddu, the sweet balls are like canon shots of happiness.

Tucking her smile away, Clarke schools her face into fake seriousness as soon as Raven and Anya say their goodbyes leaving her and Lexa standing outside the restaurant door. She says nothing, waiting on Lexa to make the first move.

Lexa, credit to her, looks immediately contrite, wrapping her arms around Clarke to pull her in by the waist. She hangs her head on Clarke’s shoulder for a moment before speaking up.

“Anya knows I’m seeing someone but doesn’t know who exactly. I was hoping to keep it that way for awhile because she has a tendency to say a lot without saying much when it comes to my love life. She might have put two and two together seeing my reaction to you tonight and this dress, that Raven’s beautiful blonde friend that Raven wanted to introduce to me is the same beautiful blonde girl I’ve been talking nonstop about.” Lexa reaches up then to trace the pad of her finger over the spot above Clarke’s upper lip. “I may have mentioned this beauty mark once or twice or too many times.”

Not expecting either the oversharing or the soft gesture, Clarke blushes at the compliments, also somewhat embarrassed by her presumption of Lexa’s motives.

“I thought maybe I was a secret.”

“No, nothing like that.”

“Or that you weren’t out to your sister.”

Lexa chuckles. ”God no. I haven’t been closeted since the womb. Anh thinks I painted our mom’s birth canal rainbow colour on my way out.”

Clarke laughs. Links their hands behind her back and tips up to peck her cheek, tasting coconut sweetness.

“Good to know you reached peak gay early.”

By the way Lexa is always looking at her, one second away from devouring Clarke whole, it’d be a monumental feat akin to climbing Everest to hide Lexa’s sapphic leaning.

“I haven’t told Anya all the details yet about us,” Lexa looks down, finding sudden interest in the neckline of Clarke’s dress, “because I wanted to keep you as mine for awhile.” Clarke’s stomach backflips on hearing that, even if Lexa may not mean it in the way that Clarke interprets. “Anya has this gift for drawing things out of me before I’m ready, and she’s been vocal about the whole Costia situation. Well, vocal in her own way.”

She wants to probe further what Lexa’s sister has said on the matter—or to what extent she knows of their extracurriculars—but contents to be pulled into a kiss.

“I didn’t want to over complicate what you and I have.”

What it is _exactly_ they have, Clarke doesn’t get to complicate by asking for clarity because Lexa is pulling them towards the direction of her apartment building after a deeper, second kiss.

Instead of taking her to another high in the bedroom as Clarke anticipated, Lexa takes them to the construction site and guides her up metal and steel, one careful footing at a time.

Halfway up the crane, Clarke has to pause to still her nerves. Despite being secured in a safety harness, her heart pulses wildly at the lack of ground beneath her feet and steadily receding from view. Only blind faith in well-placed binder clips and nylon webbing separates her from an unpleasant re-meeting with the dirt below.

Yet, if something were to happen, Clarke thinks when she eventually reaches the top, it wouldn’t be a bad way to go: falling from the sky but grounded by the gravity of Lexa’s hand in hers leading them to the perch.

“This is gorgeous.”

Clarke is sitting in front of Lexa in the only seat of the small cabin. Her breath is taken away by what’s ahead of as well as behind her. Lexa’s snug and secure hold makes relaxing possible—though is of little help to slow her heart rate—as she takes in the view. Her neighbourhood looks different from this vantage point, at once sharper and unfocused. The unobstructed sightlines reveal buildings not seen before, treetops in their late summer fullness, and an unhindered sky in the middle of changing colour. They also grant peeks through glass windows into random lives. Clarke catches glimpses of dinner tables being cleared, couples cuddling in front of TVs, kids playing in the living room, and the occasional office worker still toiling away while the day comes to a close and the night quietly descends.

The scenery reminds Clarke why she loves living in a city so much, to be a part of that concert of human activity. The willing and the trying to carve out a space, however small, and make it through another evening; to make it to another morning.

”My dad started out as a crane driver,” Lexa speaks softly, careful to not shatter the silence. “To my mom’s horror, and against every occupational health and safety regulation, he would take me up to his box at night when I couldn’t fall asleep. Back then, I was very resistant to naps and to the general concept of closing my eyes. I was really young, maybe three or four, but it’s one of my earliest, clearest memories, being secured against his chest while he climbed the crane tower. Sitting with him once we reached the top, watching the city lights below, it was the first time I fell in love with the ground.”

Clarke looks down and intently not at Lexa. An urban landscape aglow with spots of orange and white in a soft dance is certainly mesmerising. Its illumination though is not what has Clarke in agreement. “Yeah, I can see how you’d be in love.” The hushed tone makes it sound almost like a confession of something other than a recently discovered appreciation for glittered dirt.

“Easy to fall for, isn’t it?”

Clarke nods.

“Slightly worried though of your dad’s decision-making skills. It’s a pretty steep drop, babe.”

She feels Lexa stiffen at the pet name but her body loosens shortly into laughter.

“Anya is certain _my_ decision-making skills are a result of being dropped as a child. Really, I think it was one of the smaller cranes and not actually that high up.”

“Still ...”

“Yeah, still.” Lexa concurs, chuckling. “Mom would get so angry every time she retold the story.”

Clarke hears the wistfulness in her voice, leans back against Lexa as more stories spill forth. She lets Lexa do most of the talking, enjoying the silent and absorbing cinematic reel before them. Lexa tells her about The Solitary Life of Cranes, one of her favourite short films that, “Clarke, you have to watch,” which always reminds her of her dad who inspired her love of airy towers and stretched silences. Part city symphony, part visual poem, the documentary explores the invisible life of a city, its patterns and hidden secrets under the watchful eye of crane operators. A slow meditation on the changing metropolis and the people who inhabit it, Clarke would later come to appreciate its aesthetic and philosophical appeal. In the moment, with Lexa as narrator and Brooklyn as her movie screen, there’s unparalleled need to see and understand the world from any other viewpoint.

They stay up there until the blood red sunset pulls the stars down as it descends and inks the sky black.

—

Even when her feet touch ground again, her heart never quite comes down from its elevated position.

The night is romantic and poetic, and comes so perilously close to being a real date that when they return to Clarke’s apartment, a switch is flipped. Soft trades in for searing. Lexa fucks her with such intensity not so much as she is trying to reassert the boundaries of their expanding relationship, more so as if there’s too much gathered energy from the evening’s tender unfolding that the most productive place to invest it is in Clarke and in the record number of orgasms they can break.

The bed frame squeaks with Clarke’s laughter and squeal when she’s tossed on the bed after being fireman-carried across the threshold. Lexa’s over-exaggerated movements landing on top of her induce the kind of loud banging that has lately reverberated against Clarke’s walls.

Her laugh dies in her throat when Lexa gets off to pull out something from her work bag left there earlier. Clarke is nodding vigorously as Lexa seeks permission to rip open the packaging.

“I didn’t want to be presumptuous,” Lexa shyly says, unwrapping the toy then trailing to Clarke’s en-suite to give it a rinse. “But I thought this might be something we’d both enjoy.”

“You thought right. Come’re,” Clarke entreats her forward, nudging Lexa until she’s standing between Clarke’s legs at the edge of the bed. Lexa bends down to kiss her, doing minimal to contain Clarke’s excitement. “Let me.”

Clarke lifts the skirt of her dress up and helps to fit the dildo into the accompanying harness, effectively reversing their roles from when Lexa assisted earlier at the base of the crane. Along with Clarke’s own, Lexa’s dress comes fully off then, leaving them both naked save for the bright fuschia inches from Clarke’s centre.

Lexa gently pushes at Clarke’s knees, which she parts without further prompt. By the blackening of Lexa’s pupils, green nearly gone, that gentleness is the last Clarke will see for awhile.

It turns out true seconds later when Lexa enters her swiftly after stroking through her wetness in preparation. Despite how much sex they have had already, Clarke isn’t prepared for how good it feels to have Lexa take her this way. How it fills her and steals her breath in the same go. She pulls her knees back toward her chest, arms straining to hold them back by the hook of the elbow. Lexa slams into her at a pace and wildness not seen since they first hooked up. A rambling pattern, cresting to unpredictable movements. Clarke encourages her abandonment of control through noises not made to date, through words not said before.

“Baby, it’s so good,” Clarke tells her. The term of endearment must do something to Lexa’s weakening composure because Clarke next finds herself bent over the mattress edge, on her stomach and extraordinarily aroused for what Lexa will do next.

“I couldn’t stop thinking about this during dinner,” Lexa informs her as she lines up again and takes Clarke from behind. Her arm tightens around Clarke’s stomach as the dildo makes contact, hitting harder than before. “I’ve fantasised about it.”

“God, me too.” Their mutual dreaming proves mutually beneficial. Lexa’s uninhibited drilling aligns perfectly with Clarke’s insatiable need to be rawed.

While Clarke is the more outgoing of the two in their daily interactions, her assertiveness often the culprit behind Lexa’s blushes, in the bedroom and elsewhere behind closed doors she has no problem letting Lexa take charge. To find a sexual partner, willing and ridiculously capable, who takes pleasure in giving it, who’s a yin to her yang, speaks of a cosmic duality that were Clarke a believer in celestial alignment would point to the existence of soulmates rather than the confluence of pure happenstance.

Fate or fervour, the heat builds deliciously in her lower belly, Lexa’s weight pressing her deeper into the mattress.

“Clarke,” a small, desperate cry of her name is let out as Lexa ups the speed of her thrusting. Clarke claws to hang on, hands swinging out to clutch at the sides of the bed. Pulling back by the hip, propping her firmer in position, Lexa pistons assiduous in pushing Clarke to her breaking point.

“Oh, Kelly.” The slip of name of the hydraulic machinery that facilitated their introduction would have been funny for the inopportune mental association but neither of them note the error. Both are focused singularly on the similar shattering effect Lexa has on Clarke’s loss of ground.

The dildo is hitting in places Lexa’s fingers had yet to reach. Her clit is rubbing against the bedding in a particular way that each time Lexa’s thighs meet the back of hers Clarke gets closer to passing out. Somehow though, the overstimulation isn’t enough. Despite the length and thickness inside her, the emptiness is still yawning. Clarke needs _more_.

Letting go of her grip on the bed, Clarke reaches behind and pulls her cheeks back.

The action halts Lexa’s. She stutters to a stop, the dildo resting at the tip of Clarke’s entrance. What is being asked of her clear, Lexa stammers to confirm, “Are you sure?”

This is not something Clarke has ventured with others but instinctually, given how much her body has come to crave Lexa’s, it demands to be filled as never before. In an act of trust, she wants to give herself to Lexa in this way.

“Please. I need your fingers too.”

There’s a drawn out pause that Clarke worries means Lexa may not be into crossing this line. She’s ready to rescind the request but then Lexa strokes the back of her hand with her her knuckle, a heartfelt tenderness, then ghosts similar circles around Clarke’s tighter opening.

“How about just one for now?” Lexa asks in a soft, placating tone. Clarke is quick to agree, her arousal increased by the care with which Lexa wants to accommodate her want. She shudders feeling Lexa reach below to coat a finger in the ample slickness found there. Equally affected, Lexa rubs harder. The motion causes the dildo to slip further in, producing shared moans. “I’ll go slow, okay?”

Another nod then Clarke is being stretched in a whole new way. The slight sting takes a moment to get used to at first, then incrementally, the pleasure builds. Lexa works a pattern of small movements until she’s in up to the second knuckle, checking in, “Still okay?”

Clarke nods.

They both exhale heavy breaths. Lexa panting from restraining the force of her excitement; Clarke from holding off coming prematurely at the foreign but very welcomed intrusion. Surrounded by Lexa’s scent and the sound of her shallow gasps for air, Clarke’s senses are overwhelmed. When the third knuckle seals in their connection, she can’t help but come anyway.

Lexa kisses her temple and soothes, “You’re okay.”

Her reassurance turns to worry when she presumably tastes the tears in the corner of Clarke’s eye, moving to withdraw her finger.

Clarke shakes her head. “No, stay. It’s good, happy cry, promise.” Minor embarrassment aside at its early arrival, the orgasm is a productive preview of what’s to come if they keep going. She shyly admits, “I like it. A lot.”

“Yeah?” Lexa asks, sounding relieved and, equally, eager to continue. She gives an experimental wiggle.

“Yeah,” Clarke puts at rest, on the verge of begging. After a moment of adjustment to get more comfortable, she urges, “You can move now.”

On a slow exhale, Lexa reverses the sequence then repeats more fluidly as Clarke’s body opens up to the new sensation. It doesn’t take long before they find a sweet spot of a rhythm then Lexa resumes the dildo’s activities. In order to coordinate her twin efforts, Lexa moves in and out of Clarke less erratic though no less effective. The double penetration brings Clarke to unprecedented heights.

“Lexa,” she whimpers.

“God, Clarke, this is really hot.”

Clarke’s muscles contract in keen agreement. She can hear the need in Lexa’s voice and knows that when Lexa lingers at certain points of contact with the dildo it’s to give herself relief.

“I can’t believe I get to have you like this,” Lexa observes with awe. “Spread open, and so, so warm and wet. I’ve not felt this kind of heat before.” Her finger jogs in show and Clarke feels a sympathetic burn race through her core.

Maybe it’s the inadvertent dirty talk or the fog of her impending orgasm that leads Clarke to answer, “You can have me however you want. I’m yours. Now, please, make me come.”

That spurs Lexa on. The following minutes or hours, impossible to count, give way to a raw coupling that should be concerning to Clarke’s neighbours given the thinness of the walls separating their units. The bed groans emphatically.

The combination of finger and toy breaches a barrier of intimacy with Lexa that leads to a state of sublime unlike anything Clarke has felt either. To be fucked so thoroughly, to be driven into the bed and pressed in repeatedly, to be the reason for the shudder of the body on top, to be kissed so softly in her hair as Lexa tells her,

“Clarke, take it, fuck baby, take it,”

... is to feel the world remade in a blinding and blissful instant.

Clarke comes loudly, Lexa right with her.

They are sweat and bones and soaked sweetness. They are a thousand nights of a thousand cranes. Of silent movements and inaudible declarations and invisible orchestrations, merged with the clouds, hundreds of feet above ground.

When they do manage to crawl up the bed later, Clarke spoons Lexa in gratitude as she deservedly dozes off. In the soft puffs of air Lexa emits, the truth makes its first significant appearance.

This is beyond friends with benefits. Lexa is in her veins, and Clarke is clueless as to how she will get her out in four months time.

Clarke is in so much trouble.

— _V. The couch —_

“Got it out of your system?”

“Not yet.”

Clarke groans.

Lexa lifts up, and takes off again, laughing.

Legs wobbly and vision unsteady, Clarke doesn’t bother chasing after Lexa, plopping down instead on the nearest park bench.

To join Lexa in her early morning jog was a romantic notion at best. At worst, death. Every organ is struggling to keep her alive. Pretty eyes and an even prettier smile have cost her two extra hours of sleep, skipped heart beats, and pain in places that shouldn’t be possible. Clarke lies down the full length of her body, hugging the wood while her lungs scream for air and scream at Clarke for overestimating its capacity to keep up with Lexa.

She thinks she might have passed onto the next world not feeling her limbs anymore but then a hand gently shakes her, breathy laughter follows. Clarke rolls over to find a sweaty Lexa smiling down.

“Clarke, that was only the path to the trailhead. We haven’t even made it to my running route yet.”

“Fuck me,” Clarke groans again. Slapping Lexa’s hand away, covering her eyes from the morning light.

“I would love to,” Lexa retorts, peeling her fingers back to make eye contact. Her stomach flips under Lexa’s study. The sparkle of green irises, full of mirth, is a dangerous sight for her health. “But as massive of a heart boner I have for you in spandex, it’s a little early for exhibitionism, we’d want the crowd to build for my performance.”

It’s stupid that Lexa’s stupid smile makes her mirror it. Clarke seriously considers being mounted in the open of Prospect Park.

“If you do all the work, okay,” she counteroffers, patting her lap in invitation.

“Don’t I always?”

Clarke narrows her eyes but then mutters, “Not always.”

“Come on,” Lexa urges, laughing, pulling her to her feet. “I’ll let you run your fingers over my abs later if you can keep up for one lap.”

“Babe, I think there’s a better chance of me learning what an IRS is in baseball,” Clarke replies but, against better judgment, is game to try.

She makes it a quarter of the way.

“It’s actually ERA.”

“Huh?” Clarke asks, bent over, huffing and gulping down water at the drinking station like the desert is having a water sale.

Lexa takes more measured sips then wipes the excess from her lips that Clarke tracks enviously. “ERA not IRS. Earned runs average not taxes.”

“Po-tay-do, po-tah-do.” Clarke shrugs. Lexa’s explanation doesn’t make the acronym any clearer.

“You’re not entirely wrong. A lower number in both is better. ERA is determined by dividing the number of earned runs allowed by the number of innings pitched and multiplying by nine,” Lexa elaborates but when Clarke stares blankly at her string of nonsense, she sums up, “I was a pitcher.”

Clarke makes a face and a throwing gesture with her arm. “You did this?”

Lexa laughs.

“Yes. I threw balls.”

“Sports?” Clarke’s nose scrunches in disgust.

“Yes. Organised group activity.”

“Okay.”

Lexa laughs again, probably because Clarke has no further questions nor an expressed interest in why anyone would do such a thing.

She gets a backstory nonetheless. They take a leisurely stroll around the grounds, looping the lake perimeter. This pace is more of Clarke’s speed and, hearing about Lexa’s Little League adventures and highschool state championship as they amble along, makes a far more compelling case for physical exercise.

Sports has never been on her radar but to hear Lexa speak of it, Clarke thinks about rounding the bases with her.

“Did you have girls falling at your feet in highschool wanting to carry your hitting sticks for you?” She teases, at the same time imagining the likelihood of her doing the same.

“Bats,” Lexa corrects with a chuckle, then stops walking. Turns Clarke in her arms and gives her a mischievous once-over. “You’d have made a good ball girl.”

“Probably not. I spent all my time in Print Club making posters.” Clarke voices her imagined scenario and submits, “If we had dated back then, _you_ would have carried my rolls of craft paper.”

“A jock and an art nerd, what an original pair we’d make.”

“Take that back. Who you calling a nerd?” Clarke feigns offence, pushing Lexa away and walking off towards the ducks.

Lexa easily catches up, wrapping Clarke in her arms from behind, the tail end of her laughter shaking against Clarke’s back. “My apologies,” she presses into the skin of Clarke’s neck, nosing along the column up to her jaw. “I take it back. A jock and a hot nerd.”

The nuzzling turns into a kiss then another and it’s how Clarke ends up making out with Lexa against a tree. The sound of children’s laughter by the fishing pond keeps things from getting out of hand.

They spend the rest of the morning sitting at the base of the tree watching the lake activities with an agenda-less need to do anything other than entangle and disentangle the play of their fingers.

“Think you can make it to half a lap next time?”

“Unfucking likely.”

Lexa laughs, then eggs on, “What if I stood in the middle of the path naked waiting for you?”

She takes Clarke’s hand and slips it under her shirt to preview the potential reward.

“What if, instead of running, we just ... _don’t_?” Clarke quips. “There are other couple things to do that don’t involve cardiac arrest.” She doesn’t realise what’s been implied about their relationship status until Lexa’s silence speaks volumes. Clarke feigns ignorance. She waffles past the suggested meaning and avoids addressing it. “I enjoy my heart staying inside my chest.”

“I enjoy your chest too,” Lexa deliberately mishears. “10/10.”

“Ugh, do you even know how hard it is to find a comfortable enough bra to keep these monsters from saying hi to every tree we pass?”

Lexa shakes her head in false sympathy as she stares at Clarke’s breasts. Without looking up, hands formed in the shape of cups, she whispers, “I volunteer.”

Clarke pushes her away again, laughing. Lexa doesn’t go far, boomeranging back to instead cup Clarke’s face and kiss her. It’s a Saturday morning by the lake, idle kind of kiss that won’t go any further than the dip of a tongue but, at any rate, has Clarke fisting into Lexa’s tank top. Pulling her closer. Holding steady.

Things steadily slip from her grip and boundaries blur as the days pass like this. Following the night with the crane, Clarke has tried to realign her thinking to, _just friends, lots of benefits_ , sticking to the script and repeating it like a mantra, but the force of her conviction weakens by the hour, its chant dampened by the regular rush of heartbeat in her ears, the thrum of joy when Lexa nears.

Whether Clarke accepts it or not, their dynamic shifts. Their physical relationship transitions into something much, much more, than orgasms. Instead of spilt liquid at Lexa’s hands, coffee or otherwise, light spills into the cracks of a supposed to be closed off possibility.

The push and pull of wanting to spend as much time with Lexa outside as they do inside her bedroom; the embattled tug of war between head and heart to tamper the rise of feelings; the catch of breath whenever Lexa gravitates to her side anchoring Clarke with terrible jokes, disarming smiles and impossible softness—are all signs that get harder to disregard.

Not helping the matter, Lexa shows up unannounced the next Saturday morning with a bag of fresh bagels to lure Clarke out to Prospect again— _no running, promise_ —for an impromptu picnic in the park.

“Oh god,” Clarke moans, taking another large bite into her salmon and cream cheese bagel. Lexa muffles agreement, busy with her own. Clarke wipes the corner of her mouth with the back of her hand and, with a glint in her eyes, asks around a mouthful, “Just in the neighbourhood, huh?”

“It didn’t feel right to not share these.”

“Thanks, babe.”

Mid-bite, Lexa puts down her bagel to take a long swig of her coffee. There’s a questioning look behind her gaze before she verbalises her thoughts. “You do that a lot, you know?”

“Do what?”

“Call me babe.”

“Because you are one,” Clarke says, kissing her cheek with an exaggerated smack, hoping to keep her off the scent of Clarke’s uptick of heartbeat by purposefully misconstruing Lexa’s meaning. “A gorgeous babe.”

‘Baby’ often slips out during the heights of passion but its variant has since bled into their everyday exchanges. More than friendly banter, Clarke has developed the habit of using it whenever Lexa does something endearing, intentional or not. Like now, when she nervously pushes up the bridge of her glasses, eyewear that Clarke recently discovered was a thing (of which she has a thing for). Lexa only wears her binoculars (as Clarke calls them because of the strength of her prescription) when she’s really tired.

“Right, I’m a total babe.”

“You totally are. Best forehead this side of the Hudson.”

The predictable verbal objection comes in the form of a harrumph, making Clarke laugh, but she fails to anticipate the physical retaliation that forces her on her back on the picnic blanket. Lexa tickles her sides until she calls mercy.

“Why, does it bother you?” Clarke asks seriously, after catching her breath. “Want me to stop?”

“No, I like it,” Lexa says, picking at the grass by her unsocked feet. Avoiding eye contact for some reason. “Don’t stop.”

There’s no chance of that Clarke thinks as she sits back up and Lexa scoots next to her and they watch the ducks and fishing poles bob in the water in what has now become their spot by the lake.

The following week at Prospect, their now regular morning programme turns into a full Saturday involving yard sale browsing then furniture hunting for a new sofa to replace Clarke’s dilapidated one. It had been a legacy of the previous apartment owner, a pothead responsible for its unique smelling charm. Lexa jumps at the opportunity when Clarke gripes about the couch’s expired lifespan and overdue replacement, indignant of her weekend plan to later go Googling for an alternative. Lexa volunteers her service with the glee of a kid let loose in a candy store.

Apparently, the sofa that came with her executive rental unit, which Clarke has yet to visit, is too tacky for Lexa’s taste so she feels a moral obligation as a designer to help Clarke out, that way at least one of two couches she has to routinely lay eyes on won’t offend her aesthetic regime.

Harmless window shopping turns into competitive silent auction bidding.

They stumble on an old three-seater at an estate sell-off incidentally a couple blocks from her place after an unsuccessful search at the local shops. Lexa goes on about mid century this and Danish teak frame that, eyes lit up after setting upon the Arne Jacobsen with original leather.

“Pretty comfy,” Clarke concedes, bouncing on the cushion to experiment with its give. Her thoughts are elsewhere as to why bounce back is a more important selection criteria than dead Danish designers.

“This is a tenth of the price it’d normally go for,” Lexa whispers, reading the price tag’s suggested offer. Her proclamation that it’s a steal convinces Clarke to place a joke bid to Lexa’s serious delight. She goes so far as to help Clarke guard the piece from other eagle eyes, standing sentinel with arms crossed whenever a potential buyer approaches, misdirecting them to a pair of ostensibly ugly vases.

Before Clarke knows it, her name is being called for real by the auctioneer and she ends up the new owner of an old modern classic, lugging the ‘rare find’ down two streets.

Many breaks, scowls and placating kisses later, peppered with patently untrue reassurances of “It’s not far Clarke, almost there,” they manage to get the thing through her door and the old one out on the curb. Pizza and promises of sex are Clarke’s reward for foregoing the wisdom of hiring a delivery truck because of Lexa’s excitement to immediately test the couch out. Lexa comes through on the first but falls short of the latter. Just as well, Clarke’s muscles are too exhausted anyway to complain about broken promises.

She’s also too tired to realise their arrangement is crossing another threshold. Too late to see she’s _really_ in trouble when on Sunday she wakes up not in her bed but on the couch, her _new_ couch, a protective arm slung around her stomach. They must have fallen asleep last night, which isn’t unusual lately after often spirited rounds of sex. The advanced permission of their contract means Lexa has slept over on a number of occasions now, so that’s not out of the ordinary either. What is, however, is that their clothes are still on, Lexa tucked between Clarke and the couch, the back spoon to her front. Knees bent and legs entangled.

In a very platonic and domestic and consequential way.

Lexa stirs behind her, breaking Clarke’s thoughts with a groggy mumble, “Why are you up?”

Her heart stutters for a moment at the growing familiarity of having that voice in her ear as the first sound of daylight, how it intimates something else growing between them.

There had been hand holding started at the crane and continued at the lake that reflects the nature of their evolving relationship even if neither acknowledged the development, each ignoring the implication for the persistent white lie that the sex is so good, it’s a natural consequence to always want to be physically linked. Clarke knows better. She knows that the couch they hauled together, that Lexa helped to pick out, isn’t merely a friend lending a hand but another connection that’s tethering Clarke ever closer to Lexa and further away from their no strings. She knows she’s falling and that the precipice by now is precariously high.

But even knowing, it’s a problem for three months later when Lexa returns to London and leaves future Clarke to nurse her crush with a vineyard volume of regret and bad decisions.

In the present, Clarke burrows deeper into Lexa’s warmth, content to be held, gentle yet tight.

“Shhh, go back to sleep,” Clarke coos, reaching up and behind to run fingers through Lexa’s hair to soothe. She closes her eyes and lets tomorrow’s worries wash away with dreams of something permanent if not ultimately attainable.

Sometime later, the innocuous sleepover turns heated when she awakes to find their bodies have shifted to be chest to chest, legs twisted together, Lexa staring at Clarke’s mouth with obvious intent but also something a fair bit less readable when her gaze shifts to her eyes. A flicker of _maybe_ affection, if Clarke allowed herself to be hopeful.

“Hi,” Lexa says.

Clarke smiles. “Hi.”

“You’re beautiful.”

“Am I?” She fishes.

“When you snore, yeah.” Lexa grins, ignoring Clarke’s answering scowl. “It’s like a small freight train running out of gas.”

“I do not.”

“You do so.” Lexa gestures to the phone in hand, threatening with recorded proof, “I’ve got audio.”

“Nooo,” Clarke grumbles and buries her embarrassment into Lexa’s chest.

“It’s okay, I’m kinda in love with the way your nose crinkles when the train nears the station. It also does this whistling thing—”

Clarke slaps a hand over her mouth to shut her up before she can reproduce the sound. Lexa licks into her palm, laughing, and Clarke fights the swell in her chest at how different her Sundays have become. At how attached she’s getting to these pockets of joy.

Instead, sentiment yields to desire because a deep, toe-curling kiss and some fruitful grinding thereafter, clothes come off, Lexa is on her back and Clarke is straddling her stomach, painting it a shine as two sets of fingers pump steadily in matching rhythm inside each other.

“Baby, please.”

The pet name falls from her lips again without thought, Lexa’s affected reaction to it is evident in how she flips their positions, driving into Clarke with greater purpose. Clarke’s legs hooked at the knees get planted over Lexa’s shoulders, thighs sandwiched between their bare chests, spreading her wide. In this position, pressed ever further into the couch cushions, fingers feel deeper, fuller.

The heat in her lower belly pools, its hot liquid burning for release, more fiery than ever. Lexa hasn’t stopped saying Clarke’s name while breathing unintelligible promises into the circles tightening on her nipples made by a merciless tongue, the sensation gaining strength as their lower halves collide in shorter gaps.

Despite the now familiar need to break under Lexa’s care and be marked so immutably she forgets their temporary arrangement, this somehow feels different from their previous trysts.

Distinct from all other times, Lexa is now kissing her with the sort of permanence reserved for a ‘real’ couple who have been together for years and are unaffected by an ever-present cloud of impending separation; not for a pair who’ve only met three months ago and between whom there should be nothing owed but an exchange of mutually beneficial orgasms.

As she pushes and curls, Lexa is kissing and kissing Clarke in bursts of urgency, like she’s imprinting a hidden message upon Clarke without saying it. Like she too has been grappling with the unsaid in their coming together. Clarke receives her ardour best as she can, no complaint for the effort of a searching tongue.

“I love,” Lexa says and Clarke’s breath hitches looking up at her expectantly, but she seems to startle at the direction of her words, changing course abruptly at the last minute, “how you feel under me.”

To make up for her near-slip, Lexa thrusts harder, overcompensates with a brutal pace.

“Oh god,” Clarke cries, hands fly to the couch arm behind her head for purchase, and she slams her eyes shut, “harder, more.”

A third finger joins, prompting early arrival of Clarke’s orgasm within seconds of the press of a thumb to her clit. Just as Clarke spills into Lexa’s hand, a mouth seals around her cunt, drinking the overflow. Lexa’s tongue soon takes over the pumping, pushing in and out until Clarke is practically riding her face and coming again. Loudly.

Not to be outdone, Clarke is down on her knees by the couch’s edge and nudging Lexa into a sitting position for her centre to meet Clarke’s mouth. Clarke’s tongue copies the same acts that Lexa had performed. With how swollen Lexa feels, how thick she tastes, how her fingers dig into Clarke’s head and the heel of her feet into her back, it’s unsurprising seconds before her orgasm hits.

“Excellent purchase,” Lexa extols, patting the couch in praise while slightly wincing to indicate her sensitivity. She places an arm over her eyes as Clarke finishes licking her clean. “Best wake up call ever.”

“Best breakfast ever,” Clarke appends, chuckling. She rejoins Lexa on the couch.

“Morning sex is truly underrated nutritional value,” Lexa concurs. She turns her head to bop their noses together, whispers thanks, then dips in for a bonus taste of Clarke’s mouth.

Clarke’s heart skips at the casual intimacy. She has never longed for someone’s touch like this. Their nights together have been beyond her wildest sexual fantasies, but something about the softness of this Lexa in the early hours is sacred, eliciting a tingly feeling that Clarke wants to hold onto as much as possible. She asks in a gravelly, spent voice, “Better than avocado on toast?”

“Now that’s just being excessive,” Lexa says, too seriously to be taken serious. Looking thoughtful for a moment before licking her bottom lip, she reports, “You taste different in the morning.”

“I do?”

Instead of answering, she shares the taste with Clarke in a drawn out kiss. “Sweeter, somehow.”

“You too,” Clarke says, quiet and unsure how to navigate this tender moment without revealing herself or the threat of her chest cracking open after tasting this dawn-hour, honeyed mix of them again.

Protracted eye contact stretches the morning light between them until Lexa kisses her forehead and signals her leave towards the kitchen to scramble together a real breakfast. Though she’s isn’t going far, she looks as regretful as Clarke feels for their bubble to burst.

 _Is it possible to miss someone who is still in the room?_ Clarke thinks yes when Lexa’s warmth leaves the couch.

“Lex,” Clarke calls out, raising her voice to be heard over the run of water. Feeling all a sudden nervous. Feeling like she has to say something before it’s too late.

“Yeah?” Lexa asks distractedly to the followup sound of cupboards opening and closing, moving through Clarke’s kitchen like it’s her own. She lets out a triumphant whoop before Clarke hears cereal being poured, a brand that Clarke recently started to stock despite her own historical indifference to granola.

With Lexa’s clear preoccupation, the matter drops for the moment, Clarke getting up to go wash her hands and brush her teeth. Lexa comes back round to the couch to sit down minutes later with two generous bowls of cereal at the same time Clarke returns. She can’t cook but prides herself on being the best cereal assembler.

“Hi,” Lexa smiles, leaning forward to peck her on the cheek, and then takes her turn in the bathroom, “be right back.”

When Lexa re-emerges donning a different pair of Clarke’s sweats, they’re a picture of Sunday morning laziness, legs hooked at the ankles, swinging languidly.

“I tried putting avocado in here once,” Lexa says around a crunch of oats and almonds, “would not recommend.”

Thankfully, when Clarke looks down, there are blueberries instead in her bowl, which they picked up yesterday at the farmer’s market after the lake and before the furniture shopping. Along with a bouquet of flowers, Lexa paid for two baskets when she found out Clarke was mildly obsessed with the fruit. Seeing the addition of extra maple syrup, the only way Clarke can bring herself to swallow the healthy meal, she feels added warmth. Feels her chest expanding once more.

Retreading her earlier thoughts, Clarke clears her throat then dives right in, “If you felt something, you’d tell me, right? You’d say it?”

“Feel what?”

“Remember what you said?”

“What I said?”

“About our deal?”

“Our deal?”

Clarke huffs at the parroting. Lexa laughs, apologises by giving her a sticky kiss to the corner of her mouth.

“Sorry, right. Our contract?” Lexa asks. Clarke aimlessly moves her spoon around her cereal bowl. Nods. Lexa lifts her chin, smiles softly. “I remember.”

“It’s been three months, I’m checking in,” Clarke explains. To dampen her resurfaced nerves, she lightly jokes, “Have you fallen in love with me yet?”

Lexa misses her mouth with the next bite and nearly spills the spoon of overflowing milk.

“We agreed that if either of us got attached or felt anything more than friendship, we would stop,” Clarke reminds.

Lexa nods, as though processing the information for the first time, like its news to her. But then, recovering, she sets her breakfast aside and contemplates her answer, looking to be reading Clarke for clues. Her eyes soften with an emotion that Clarke can’t decode.

“We don’t have to stop,” Lexa says, coming to a conclusion that provides no greater clarity for Clarke. She doesn’t know whether to be happy that they can continue or disappointed that this confirms no feelings on Lexa’s part.

“We don’t?”

“Nope. I’m good with how I’m feeling, unless you ...”

“I’m good, too,” Clarke agrees, perhaps too readily, putting extra force behind her smile. Biting her lip in the process of biting back her confession.

“Good.” If Lexa’s returned smile appears just as weak, it may be wishful thinking.

“Great.”

Clarke refocuses on her breakfast, unsurprisingly, her appetite diminishes.

They eat in silence for awhile. The quiet is contemplative, commensurate with the rain that’s started to come down, the pitter patter rapping against the windows.

As if aware of the undertow that risks dragging their Sunday to uncharted waters, Lexa nudges her foot against Clarke’s leg to gain her attention. “Hey, you know what’s also great?”

“What’s that?” Clarke strains for another smile which turns genuine then curious seeing Lexa’s more playful and suspicious one.

Lexa clears their breakfast in a hurry then disappears momentarily before returning with an armful of blankets and rearranging Clarke on the floor in front of the couch. Coffee table pushed aside, the blanket fort setup successfully reverses the downturn of her mood.

Because of her higher than normal internal temperature, Clarke is sweating profusely within minutes. Noticing, Lexa starts pawing at her clothes trying to be ‘helpful’ by peeling them off, cracking her up. Clarke gives into her laughter and allows Lexa to disrobe her until they’re both near naked with only underwear left on. Never mind that the overheating problem could have been avoided by not using blankets in the first place. Lexa’s effort to create a cosy atmosphere to shelter against the backdrop of dark clouds, washes Clarke over with a pleasant warmth.

A kiss on the nose later, Lexa determinedly scrolls through Clarke’s Netflix queue and makes a dorky fist pump after landing on the right title. Clicking play, Lexa turns to her, wearing an impish smile, and belatedly answers, “A rainy Keeanu Sunday.”

They snuggle up for a marathon of Keanu Reeves, first up, Hardball in which he coaches a misfit crew of Little Leaguers. Clarke objected at first after finding out it’s a sports film but she’s quickly won over by the movie’s heart and is completely enamoured by the time she catches Lexa mouthing silently to Keanu’s butchered attempt to rap Big Poppa to encourage his young pitcher. She’s in stitches when Lexa jumps up on her feet and tries to persuade Clarke to likewise _throw your hands in the air, if you’s a true player_. Biggie is probably rolling in his grave over their poor mimicry of the lyrics but Clarke’s stomach hurts with laughter as she rolls on the floor, tears in her eyes watching Lexa roll her hips rhythmically yet somehow asynchronous to the soundtrack.

When Lexa rejoins her, pouting for Clarke to take baseball rap seriously; when later the final credits roll at the end of Speed and Lexa is snoring lightly against her shoulder, hand mindlessly circling Clarke’s stomach under her shirt; and when they break the couch in further under the receding greyness of the passing storm, hearts racing in timed beats, Clarke realises this is good too. This laughter, this friendship. This making each other feel good. This everything but love.

Her mood brightens considerably and she accepts the conditions of their prior-agreed arrangement, despite the outcome of where they’re headed. With blinders newly back on, it’s why when Lexa spends three nights in a row over and they reach another milestone of their non-relationship the next day, Clarke thinks nothing of it.

“I better get to the office,” Lexa informs as she searches for her borrowed joggers in the morning, lodged somewhere under the bed. “Not looking forward to sneaking into my trailer and avoiding the walk of shame. If you think guys who believe neon safety yellow is a fashion statement wouldn’t notice I’ve been coming in wearing the same pair of slacks, you’d be wrong. At least I’ve got an emergency change of outfit there since I won’t have time to swing by my place,” she narrates while looking.

Without thinking, Clarke suggests, poking her head out of the bathroom with the toothbrush paused in her mouth, “You could always leave extra clothes here. I’ve got a spare drawer or two.”

Lexa almost topples over at the offer, one pant leg halfway in. She opens and closes her mouth a few times but nothing comes out, visibly struggling to process what sounds like Clarke asking her to move in. Finishing with the other pant leg, Lexa exits without a word into the living room to look for the other missing half of her clothes. Expression twisted in sudden deep thought.

After yesterday’s checkin of where they stand, Clarke is unsure how to read Lexa’s reaction, whether the literal running away is possibly linked to having second thoughts and wanting to call the whole thing off. Spitting out the toothpaste, she considers a retraction of the offer but then in searching for her own clothes finds several items of Lexa’s already amongst her belongings in the closet. Noting the running wear mixed in with Clarke’s casual wear, the two hard hats sitting on top of the wardrobe chest, the books and eyeglasses by the side table, along with the bed sheets and pillowcases that indelibly hold their shared scent, Clarke realises there is no going back.

“It’d be more convenient,” she continues the conversation, joining Lexa where she is looking around the couch area which had been abandoned in disarray the night before for the bedroom. Friends with co-living benefits doesn’t really have an equivalent truth ring to, _I’ve fallen hard for you and suppressing my feelings so we can keep doing what we’re doing while I pine endlessly because this is what I willingly and idiotically signed up for_ , but it’s a meanwhile solution that surely will make it easier for them to not stop as agreed. Careful not to rock the tenuous boat they’ve only recently anchored, Clarke keeps expectations in check. “It’s not like a marriage proposal or anything.”

Lexa bangs her head against the coffee table where she’s crouched looking under the couch. She sputters, “Yes, uh, no ... I’d marry ... you,” before ending on a self-chastising sigh at the word gumbo, shaking her head to clear the cobwebs. She finds her top and pulls it over. “You’re right, it would save me the commute back to my place.”

Clarke nods, encouragingly, like it makes total sense.

Lexa sits on the couch which Clarke takes the opening to immediately settle onto her lap. Clarke rubs the back of her head, smoothing over the small bump. Lexa’s eyelids flutter close at the finger combing of her hair, her hand rounding to Clarke’s ass lightly squeezing in gratitude. “Look, my closet is half empty. There’s plenty of space for your collection of weirdly identical black shirts. Plus, imagine how many more avocados you can buy with all that extra gas money saved.”

“Mhmm,” Lexa acknowledges, slumping further into Clarke’s care. “That would be nice. _This_ is nice.”

So nice in fact, Clarke digs herself deeper, lulled into a false sense of security by the low moans Lexa let out while Clarke massages her scalp.

“I’ll give you my spare key. Use it whenever you want so you’re not waiting for me if I’m out at the gallery. Leave some stuff here, no need to pack an overnight bag each time. None of this means anything, okay? Just more convenience,” she downplays, conscious not to scare Lexa away if she is content for things to remain the same. Whether Clarke’s trying to convince herself or Lexa is besides the point. The odd look she receives in turn keeps things inconclusive. ”We’re both feeling good, remember? We still continue doing what we do,” Clarke plays with the drawstring of the joggers, then waves a hand between their chests, “which is each other.”

“Put that way, who could say no.” Lexa cups her breast, repeating the same motions Clarke’s been doing to her head.

“We’re still us, except with a few extra articles of yours here so you’d stop stealing mine.” Clarke snaps the waistband against her taut stomach in reprimand for the thievery of her favourite lounge threads. She disregards the playful glare and kisses the underside of Lexa’s jaw as a countermeasure to smooth out the frown lines. Lexa goes pliant under her caress, her hips react as much as her lips seek out Clarke’s pair.

They kiss for awhile. Forgetting about checkins and boundaries and conveniences.

“Still us, huh?”

Lexa’s hand snakes around her waist, pulling Clarke in closer.

The fact that there even is an _us_ , both of them glosses over in favour of Clarke grinding against her. Lexa’s forehead falls against Clarke’s chest as they start things up again. She reciprocates, rocking up to Clarke too.

“Do you really have to go now?” Clarke asks, her voice suddenly huskier than a second ago.

“Not this very minute, no.”

“Think of it,” Clarke continues the previous thread, holding onto Lexa’s shoulder for anchor while she rises and drops, aiming to allay any lingering doubt, “as another three months of this fun. Less travel time, more efficient us time.” Soft moans and intermittent grunts bracket their renegotiations. Any perceived anxieties fall wayside, traded in for a different rush of feelings.

“I’m a fan of efficiency,” Lexa avows, speeding up in concert with Clarke’s dry humping movements. “Quickies, particularly.”

“Nothing has to change.”

It’s the boldest lie yet, given that they’re both chasing the nth orgasm on a couch that they had purchased together, which has irrevocably altered the composition of Clarke’s apartment, if not the state of her heart.

Everything has already changed.

_— VI. The cart —_

Since denial works wonders to warp perception of reality, Clarke doesn’t notice everything does change after those first mornings on _their_ couch.

They’re small and insignificant on their own, but by increment and in aggregate, as more of Lexa’s things show up in her loft, the landscape of Clarke’s everyday transforms without notice. Under the guise of convenience, a toothbrush sits next to Clarke’s on the bathroom counter, an unfamiliar brand of specialty shampoo and conditioner joins her generic products in the shower, a new set of towel gets its own shelf in the linen closet, more granola appears in her pantry, and an unconscionable amount of avocados creep onto her weekly grocery list.

First, an extra weeknight expands the schedule of Lexa’s work week visits to her apartment, then, Saturdays and Sundays are added to the roster, the weekend folding into the mix. Commonplace and routine, more together than apart. While sex still remains a much thirst-after feature of time spent in each other’s presence, the chase of highs becomes inversely proportional to the amount of non-sex, domestic things they increasingly do together.

Like, grocery shopping, where they are currently in a standoff in the snack aisle.

“Oh my god, you’re one of those,” Clarke bursts out in realisation, wagging an incriminating finger, the sight before her newly revealing of Lexa’s obstinacy.

“One of what?”

“Those people who refuse to go back for a basket.”

Lexa looks indignant at Clarke implying she doesn’t have the strength or mental fortitude to juggle multiple items in her arms. “I can carry it,” she asserts with a jutted chest.

“Ok, babe,” Clarke pats her arm good-naturedly and then, meanly, adds a hefty handful of organic dried figs and a large bag of walnuts onto the already precarious pile. It takes some effort to hold back her laugh watching Lexa struggle to accommodate the new additions, using her chin as leverage.

A suspended minute of shuffling that veers dangerously close to a complete toppling ends in a brilliant, self-satisfied smile. Elbows pointed outwards at a ridiculous angle and knees bent for stability. Success is written all over Lexa’s face, if not relief. “See? Nothing to worry about.”

Clarke tips on her toes to reward her stubbornness with a congratulatory peck on the cheek, “Well done, honey.” Lexa’s ears pink, whether because Clarke’s breath is hot in her ear or because of the new term of endearment, she doesn’t wait around to find out. Walking away, Clarke coolly informs over her shoulder, “We also need to pick up a bag of potatoes for the homemade fries you love so much. Think you could carry that, too?”

A stifled groan answers her. Clarke laughs, headed back to the front of the store to retrieve a shopping cart.

Rolling up to Lexa with an empty cart after, she taunts, “You mind watching this for me? I don’t want anyone stealing it while I go look for popcorn.”

Lexa narrows her eyes and shifts on her feet, looking to be grappling with jealousy over the cart’s holding capacity. Clarke slaps her on the bum as she walks past, and feels vindicated a moment later from her spying spot around the corner seeing Lexa surrender and dump her haul into it, shoulders slagging in happiness after unloading.

Her victory is short lived. As Clarke turns to go, she runs right smack into someone’s chest and stumbles backward to find a familiar pair of brown eyes.

“Oh, hi, Anya,” Clarke greets breathless. The grunt of acknowledgment she receives in turn has Clarke nervously squeezing the bicep of Lexa’s sister, which she had held onto in their collision. “I see muscles run in the family.”

At the arched eyebrow, another genetic blueprint, Clarke retracts her hand slowly.

With perfectly imperfect timing, they hear, “Baby, okay, fine, you’re right—” before Lexa cuts herself off and careens to a halt, the cart stopping short of pushing into Clarke’s back.

“Anya?”

“Baby?” Anya asks, the eyebrow this time directed at Lexa.

The silent conversation between the siblings does nothing for Clarke’s nerves. She exhales when Lexa at last breaks it with a mea culpa.

“Okay, fine, you’re both right.” She turns to Clarke. “You’re right, I can’t carry everything and asking for help is not weakness.” Then turns back to Anya. “And you’re right, Clarke is who I’ve been seeing.”

The unexpected public confirmation—an unambiguous signalling of them as a twosome—hits Clarke squarely in the chest. She can’t help the smile that breaks forth.

“No shit, Lexa.”

Anya appears bored by the disclosure, like Lexa has just informed her chickens lay eggs.

“Wait, how’d you know?”

“I have eyes,” Anya replies, a touch of exasperation and fondness for her sister’s obviousness. “And ears. You can’t shut up about soft hands and yellow hair.” She zones in on the cart and the carton of coffee filters. “Also, you hate coffee.”

“What, you do??” Clarke interjects.

“Hate is such a strong word. Aggressive dislike, maybe,” Lexa tries to minimise, rubbing a hand to the back of her neck in nervous fidget. When Clarke looks unamused by the semantic distinction, she relents. “Didn’t I mention that when we met?”

To think of it, Lexa may have told her but Clarke was too busy picking her jaw off the floor and fighting her attraction to properly note Lexa’s drink preference.

Despite Lexa’s evident panic at being called out in front of someone who’s plied her with copious amounts of roasted beans, Anya needles the point, content in her older sibling duty to cause her younger sister further distress. “Four year old Lexa had thought Mom’s coffee mug was hot chocolate. She didn’t sleep for three days and cried like a _baby_ for weeks about a tummy ache.”

The anecdote connects the dots to the crane story and little Lexa’s battle with sleep. Endeared, Clarke places a hand on her lower back and rubs gentle circles. “Aw, poor baby.”

“I _was_ practically a baby,” Lexa pouts but leans into the comforting touch.

Less endeared, Anya chides, changing the topic. “I’ve been trying to call you.”

“I’ve been busy,” Lexa deflects, her cheeks bloom for a different reason.

“I’d rather not imagine it,” Anya says, keying into the meaning of Lexa’s incriminating blush. She turns to Clarke. “Show up at my house at seven on Friday. I’m cooking. Don’t be late.”

An unspoken ‘or else’ hangs ominously, the invitation to dinner sounding more like a threat.

“Am I invited too?” Lexa asks.

“Don’t be late,” Anya repeats in lieu of a direct answer, the veil of danger not lifting.

Clarke gulps but nods acceptance on their behalf against Lexa’s whispered objection, “This feels like a trap.” Anya nods back, then turns on her heel and leaves without a goodbye. The mystery of why she’s in a bodega in Clarke’s neighbourhood remains unsolved.

Alone again, Clarke enters another standoff with Lexa, who is looking anywhere but in Clarke’s eyes.

“So you aggressively dislike coffee?”

Scuffing her toe against the floor, Lexa shrugs.

“Lexa!” Clarke reprimands. “Why didn’t you say something? I thought you liked _notes of roasted hazelnut and orange_?”

“I do,” Lexa admits, then quieter, ”I like it with you,” a mumble Clarke wouldn’t have heard had they not been standing so closely.

Clarke sighs. Softens. Taking charge of the cart, “Come on,” she urges, turning them round in the direction of a different aisle. She says nothing more, but the grateful hand that slips into the back pocket of her jeans—and the soft kiss to the top of her head—when they approach the herbal tea section, says plenty.

—

“I didn’t know you were dating, Clarke,” Lincoln comments while passing the mashed potatoes to her.

The smile given by Octavia’s boyfriend in her and Lexa’s direction belie the loadedness of his presumption, which she doesn’t bother to correct. Lexa seems okay with the label too, unaffected by the nominal difference between ‘seeing’ and ‘dating’ and the latter’s encroachment into exclusive terrain.

“Uh, yeah, it’s been fun,” she settles on as a reply. Lexa rubs her thigh, out of view, in what is meant to be support but her hand travels accidentally too high. Clarke takes a large pull from her wine.

The drinking had started early once Clarke realised the lay of the land of Anya’s invite when Raven answered the door. It dawned on her as she entered into the apartment with Lexa and saw Octavia and Lincoln cosied up on the sofa that, more accurately, tonight is a _couples_ dinner rather than the shovel talk she was expecting from Anya. She’s going to have to have a talk with Raven later about letting Clarke walk into dinner parties without warning about who may show up.

“Clarke is lots of fun,” Lexa confirms, her input drawing the attention of three other sets of eyes.

“I bet,” Raven remarks while Anya looks ready to projectile herself into the stratosphere with the conversation’s turn to her little sister’s sex life. “From experience, she can be really good fun.”

Octavia sniggers while Clarke glares at Raven in horror and hopes that Lexa didn’t catch the insinuation.

“From experience?”

Not a chance. Clarke should’ve known with how astute Lexa is that a minor detail as such wouldn’t escape her notice.

Lexa looks back and forth between her and Raven, taking in Clarke’s best friend slash her sister’s girlfriend in a new light. Past the inquisitive interest, there’s a hint of jealousy on her face, the corner of her mouth bit in thought. Clarke feels a minor thrill catching the break in her normally unreadable facade.

To Raven’s delight, Clarke knocks Lexa by the shoulder and scolds, “Stop imagining us naked!” Clarke rolls her eyes. “It was one, fully clothed, drunken college kiss, and barely. Rey likes to think it rocked my world but her lips came at me more like a pebble on the road that hit the windshield of my car at high speed. Out of nowhere and really disturbing.”

“Oh, please, it was the happiest seven minutes in a closet of your life.”

Lincoln chuckles at both of their descriptions.

Lexa’s hand tightens higher on her thigh, fingers tapping out a secret message. Clarke flushes red reminded of the better seven minutes, before they arrived here, spent on her kitchen counter with Lexa on her knees between Clarke’s legs.

Cutting in to get things back on track, Octavia observes, addressing Lexa, “I haven’t seen this one for awhile but she sounds happy whenever we do talk, even if I didn’t know what or who has been keeping her away.” Clarke feels chastised by her pointed look.

“You’ve got more important things to think of than worrying about how I spend my time, O,” Clarke excuses her absence, reaching over to gently pat her friend’s protruded belly.

Lincoln beams proud. The smile quickly drops when Octavia glares at him, “You try walking around with a basketball-size squatter on your bladder.”

Like a well-coordinated couple would, Lexa takes the baton from Clarke and runs with the opening to change the subject. “How far along are you?”

The question diverts the chat successfully toward talk of Octavia’s pregnancy and Lincoln’s extreme preparedness, the late night cravings and their shortlist of baby names. Over the flow of alcohol and laughter and disagreements about the merits of fruit-based names for children, it’s one of the best evenings Clarke has enjoyed in recent memory, outside of Lexa’s company.

An animated discussion about reusable cloth versus store-bought disposable diapers divides the table into two staunch camps for and against, sustainability versus convenience. Lexa surprisingly has a lot to say on the matter. A co-worker in London swore by the weekly door service that picks up soiled diapers and drops off a new supply of freshly laundered ones. It’s an ethical alternative that saves both time and the environment, Lexa argues.

Unsatisfied with everyone around the table nodding in agreement, Raven counter-argues that it’s just displaced labour, costing someone else’s time and is also cost prohibitive because the service is limited to a certain income level. The tide turns in her favour, the nods in her direction.

Outnumbered, Lexa sinks back in her seat and complains privately to Clarke, “But it’s called Nappy Ever After. I should get points on that alone.”

“I’m on your side, honey,” Clarke placates, giving her a conciliatory kiss on the mouth. Were they alone, she would deepen it feeling Lexa melt under the gentle press of her lips.

Their intimate interchange doesn’t go unnoticed by Anya, who Clarke locks eyes with when her attention returns to the others. It’s a knowing look that she can’t quite decipher but there’s acceptance there and Clarke is relieved to have seemingly passed whatever test.

Overall, the night feels like a glimpse into another life that Clarke and Lexa have lived before, into an established rhythm that may have been a possibility had they met under different circumstances. Sitting next to Lexa while she charms attentive listeners with stories of the differences between English and American cultures, of her mistaken assumption that Brits are very affectionate people because everyone in East London calls her Darling; feeling the warmth radiating between them while their hands are held under the table at every opportunity between bites from their dishes, unable to tamper her smile; it reads like this an epilogue—an unmet future—within Clarke’s grasp, written inside the pages of a book that she’s only begun the prologue. So much is being said in the footnotes of Lexa leaning over and giving her chaste cheek kisses, of Clarke giving Lexa an extra piece of her drumstick, of various knowing looks from across the table that neither catches because they’re too absorbed in the minutiae of the other.

It feels like an inflection point of no return. They’re at juncture that, with how Lexa and Anya folds into her friend group, should give Clarke pause for how far past unattached this thing with Lexa has become; that, the exchange of banter and the taking of turns teasing different partners quirks, should have Clarke slamming on the breaks. It’s not a relationship in the same way as the one with Octavia and Lincoln looking at onesies, nor the one with Raven and Anya hosting dinner as a twosome in their new shared space. What she and Lexa has is an arrangement. A contract with explicit terms for not getting hurt, for not crashing head first into the inevitable. Yet, there’s no slowing down the speed with which her heart daily and nightly races toward its beating counterpart. The butterflies are wild by now. There’s no stopping them. There’s no denying the obvious. That, Clarke is in love.

“Hey, lover girl,” Raven shouts across the living room where they relocated for drinks, with Octavia’s help snapping her fingers in front of Clarke’s face to grab her attention.

“Sorry, what?” Clarke replies, feeling her cheeks warm, caught staring at Lexa.

“Your turn,” Lexa helpfully supplies, a soft smile as she tucks a strand of hair behind Clarke’s ear.

 _Oh, right. Two truths and a lie._ The juvenile game they’ve been playing to see how well they each know their partners.

Clarke taps her chin in faux thinking, buying herself time while Lexa looks at her head on, ready to judge Clarke’s lying skills.

“Alright, one, I once licked a painting in front of a buyer at one of my shows. Two, I was named after Clark Gable because Dad thought for sure I’d be a boy.” Clarke lists off on her fingers. “And three, I’ve never said I love you in any of my romantic relationships.”

Clarke does her best to not break eye contact nor give anything away, stiffening her poker face.

Lexa studies her intently. Clarke’s heart is beating out of her chest wondering if Lexa can read a bigger truth concealed within the smaller one.

“Hmm, let’s see. I’ve found paint in very odd places on your body so it’s not out of the realm of possibility you’d eat it. I’m going to eliminate option one,” Lexa deduces. “And we’ve watched Gone with the Wind a number of times too many for it not to mean something, so number two can’t be the lie either. That leaves three. Although it’s a rather oddly specific detail for it not to be truthful, and there’s no way for me to actually verify, you were with Niylah for a few years. I’m going to go with three as the lie. I can’t imagine those words were not said.”

They weren’t. Clarke loved Niylah in her own way, and despite equal effort to make more out of an easy comfort, they remained casual. Niylah didn’t make her heart do somersaults the way it does now watching Lexa watch her. If Niylah was a stream—a pleasant brook to occasionally dip her toes—then Lexa is the ocean—a sea of longing to completely submerge her body.

Clarke shakes her head.

“I was named after Austin Clarke, the Gaelic-Irish poet,” she corrects. “My parents honeymooned in Ireland and were swept up by its landscape. Dad could hardly string together a limerick but thought himself suave enough to recite his verses after their trip, and clever enough to know of a wordsmith besides Yeats.”

Lexa smiles though there’s a tinge of shock and confusion behind her eyes that her assessment is off-based.

Clarke elaborates, “Mom was taken with one particular poem about freedom and beauty of the sky in celebration of artistic skill. It’s called Japanese Print.”

“How does it go?”

 _“Both skyed  
_ _In south-west wind beyond  
_ _Poplar and fir tree, swallow,  
_ _Heron, almost collide,  
_ _Swerve  
_ _With a rapid  
_ _Dip of wing, flap  
_ _Each in an opposite curve,  
_ _Fork-tail, long neck outstretched  
_ _And feet. All happened  
_ _Above my head. The pair  
_ _Was disappearing. Say I  
_ _Had seen, half hint, a sketch on_  
 _Rice-coloured air,  
_ _Sharako, Hokusai!”_

It’s either Clarke’s soft whisper of the last three lines or the striking imagery of rice-colour air but Lexa seems enchanted by the live reading.

“Are you the heron or the swallow?” She asks.

“Okay!” Raven interrupts loudly, startling Clarke who had forgotten they have an audience. “That’s enough foreplay. I’d like to keep my dinner down.”

A chorus of agreement rings round, she and Lexa both blush. Anya looks about as amused as a caged bald eagle.

“My morning sickness isn’t half as bad as what just happened there and I’ve been vomiting non-sto—”

Lincoln kindly cuts off the rest of Octavia’s complaint by appealing to her competitive streak and engaging everyone in a game of couples charades.

The redirection means Clarke doesn’t get a chance to explain the truth about words she hadn’t said out loud before. Fittingly, she spends the next hour miming to Lexa things she can’t vocalise.

Two weeks later, a different context prompts those words to find voice, causing a different stirring in Clarke’s stomach.

“Lexa, I think we need to stop,” Clarke says, the feeling that’s been bubbling to the surface for weeks now is beyond containment. Sweaty from their latest round, breath laboured, it takes a stretched second before Lexa registers her request. She stills completely, her body stiffens as the suggestion lands thick with meaning between them.

“You want to stop?”

“I think _I_ need to stop,” Clarke reasserts and pauses to drum up courage. “I’m afraid I’m ...” but then Lexa is the one looking afraid, looking scared, eyes begging Clarke not to finish the expected trajectory of that sentence, so Clarke chickens out and alters her path, pivoting at the last second, “in lust with you.”

Lexa exhales, expressing what appears to be palpable relief at the changed course. Clarke’s heart sinks despite hearing an affirmative, “I’m in lust with you, too.”

Lexa’s agreement is quiet and soft, and if Clarke wasn’t scrambling to find her clothes to cover up and feel less vulnerable, she might have read the hidden double meaning behind the shared sentiment. Clarke pushes down the sting of inadvertent rejection. “Need to tap out. As much as my body is lusting for another round,” she finishes the thought, “I’m starving.”

Clarke’s swift leave of the bed must raise an alarm bell because Lexa pulls her gently back into her lap. “Hey, you okay?”

“Yeah, yeah, just hungry,” Clarke lies, dipping down to kiss her on the forehead, then on the mouth. She deflects, hoping to ease Lexa’s worried look, “I think there might be some leftover bindi masala from the other night. Want me to cook more basmati rice to go with it? I could also stir fry prawns as a side.”

“Sounds amazing,” Lexa says, upbeat, trying to lift Clarke’s subtle mood change while still searching her eyes for its hidden cause. “Can we watch Street Food? The one on hawker stands.”

Clarke yields, smiles, finding consolation in Lexa’s softness. Neither of them registers the domesticity of the whole sequence of this interaction. Not Lexa’s thumbs rubbing small circles on Clarke’s hipbone; not Clarke sighing into the placating kiss that follows, which silently asks for forgiveness to a tacit offence; not Clarke’s menu planning that’s carefully crafted to Lexa’s diet and their post sex activity routine of food and food-watch binging. Clarke swallows her confession into the kiss, lets the other, unspoken ‘l’ word find temporary home between tender lips where it’s been elsewhere residing more permanently in her heart.

“Okay, you go set up on the couch, and I’ll be out in a second,” Clarke instructs and forces a smile as she lifts off to head into the bathroom for cleanup. It’s more tenuous than she would like but is fortunately missed by Lexa anyway who appears lost in thought at the emotional distance that’s crept up between them.

The remainder of the night is spent huddled on _their couch_ in a two-person woollen cocoon. After the Indian food, they move onto finishing off leftover chips and homemade salsa from the previous night. Even if the hesitation from earlier lingers, there isn’t anything physically tentative about the way Lexa wraps her arm around Clarke’s shoulder in the name of shared heat despite late August temperatures climbing towards triple digits. Nothing unsure about how she occasionally and very tactilely checks in, ready with a kiss to Clarke’s forehead, a rub of her knee, or a deeper press into her side.

It’s a complicated dance of advance and retreat and Clarke doesn’t know who’s leading it.

There’s a subtle yet clear setting of boundaries of where Lexa’s comfort lies when it comes to the elasticity of their relationship’s development. Stretching her long limbs over Clarke’s lap and allowing herself to be used as a human burrito is okay it would seem; but any expansion into feels territory—locked gazes that stray too long, talks that veer too close to emotions—elicits a contraction.

Lexa overcorrects and becomes even more attentive with her disaffected affection. It overwhelms Clarke in a way that makes staying quiet worthwhile but also keeps her stuck between a rock and a hard place.

—

“You should tell her, Clarke,” Octavia encourages.

“I don’t think she feels the same O.” Clarke sighs into the phone, rolling onto her back and staring up at the stars of her childhood bedroom ceiling.

Visiting her parents north of the city to get a few days of clarity, Clarke misses Lexa who has gone on a camping trip with Anya and their father, the Woods annual autumn outing. Octavia’s been keeping her company for the last hour while she contemplates what to do about the stickiness of her feelings that simply, stubbornly, won’t unstick.

“I’m gonna go out on a limb here but ...” Octavia pauses for dramatic effect, “... what if she does?”

Clarke scoffs. Even after knowing the predictable response was coming, she finds it improbable. “I’ve tried to bring it up twice now, and each time she looks ready to bolt.”

“I know the second trimester can wreck havoc on a woman’s body but I don’t think I’ve gone blind.”

“You’ve lost me,” Clarke doesn’t know what to make of Octavia’s non-sequitur.

“From what I saw at Rey and Anya’s dinner, I think Lexa does feel the same,” Octavia explains. “Or something close. From the way she looks at you, there’s gotta be something there.”

“You really think?” Clarke asks, sighing into the phone and twirling a strand of hair around her finger like a schoolgirl talking about her crush.

“You’ve started spending time at her place too, right? Isn’t she over by the Yards, which is way out of the way.”

“Yeah, so what?” Clarke answers, going with the flow of Octavia’s shifting focus.

“Clarke, have you been using protection?”

The abrupt change in topic again throws her further off. “Come again?”

“Maybe that’s your problem, too much coming. I swear between the two of us, you’re the one with pregnancy brain,” Octavia admonishes.

“What do you mean? Talk to me like I’m five.”

“God, this is good practice for my parenting skills,” Octavia mutters, letting out small inarticulate noises, sounding like she’s shifting position to get comfortable. “K, I’ll speak slower and spell it out for you like we’re doing preschool arithmetic. You and Lexa have been together for how long now?”

“We’re not together,” Clarke objects, “I told you, it’s a friends with benefits type of thing,” but at Octavia’s displeased grunt, she relinquishes the thin distinction, “Four and three quarters months.”

“Right, and in four and three quarters months, how much sex have you had?”

“A lot. She’s really, _really_ , good in bed, O.” Clarke bites her lip thinking of Lexa’s. “She does this unbelievable thing with her mouth—”

“Ewww, ew, no. _No_ , Clarke. I don’t need the details,” Octavia firmly contends. Clarke can imagine her plugging her ears. Past an exaggerated shudder, her friend asks, “How about recently?”

“Still a lot.”

“But not always?”

“No, not always,” Clarke replies, slower this time, trying to follow the logic of Octavia’s line of questioning.

“So there are times when you don’t actually have sex?”

“Well, yeah, of course. We cook, cuddle, nap together.” Lots of cuddling, to think of it.

“Things Lincoln and I do, that Raven and Anya do,” Octavia summarises like she is indeed addressing a preschooler. “And these times, do they happen to be somewhere across Midtown, oh, say waaaayyy out of the way?”

“When she’s working from her design studio, she invites me over.”

“So, it’s late, Lexa calls you, you come, and all you guys end up doing is ... take a nap?”

_Oh._

It clicks. Clarke makes a reluctant noise of acknowledgement, because yes, them being at Lexa’s recently was no longer about sex and convenience. Getting together at Clarke’s apartment after Lexa’s shift has always been about expediency of getting off. But trekking across several boroughs, at Lexa’s request, on days when Lexa is not on site in Brooklyn—simply because Lexa misses her space heater—speaks of a deliberateness on her part to be with Clarke for the sake of being with Clarke.

“Oh,” she says out loud this time.

Octavia takes that as confirmation that Clarke can do math. Two plus two equals four.

“My job is done,” she proclaims. “If you feel it, you should say it, Clarke. I am a hundred percent certain Lexa feels the same, so much so that I’m willing to let Lincoln name our child after a Disney character if I’m wrong. I have to go pee now.”

She hangs up abruptly, leaving Clarke to stare at her phone and to grapple with the realisation that maybe things with Lexa aren’t so one-sided after all.

Before she can dwell further, her phone lights up again, displaying the subject of her agonising.

“Hey,” she answers half way through the first ring.

“Hi—” There’s ruckus in the background, a mix of loud thumping and indecipherable but animated talk making it hard to hear the rest of the greeting until the sound of a zipper closing dampens all the noise. “Hi, sorry. They’re going to kill each other over who can chop wood better. I’m hiding in my tent now. Thank god I had the foresight to pitch it far away from their Highland games.”

Clarke laughs, giddy to hear Lexa’s voice, even if its coloured by tiredness.

“It’s going well then?”

“I forgot how competitive Dad and Anya can be. And how out of practice _I am_ with an axe,” Lexa groans, and Clarke hears what sounds like stretching when she adds, “and out of shape.”

Clarke doubts that’s true but humours her whining as she listens to the story of the other two trying to split wood until logs became stick-thin kindle.

“He’s got the size and experience advantage but she has technique plus pure rage, so it’s a toss-up of who’ll come out on top. At the rate they’re going we’ll have toothpicks for firewood. I’m forecasting a cold night in my near future.”

“If I was there, I’d keep you warm.” Clarke doesn’t mean to be a sap, it just comes naturally around Lexa.

“I miss you,” Lexa replies in lieu of a direct answer. The soft, unexpected, admission sends a flutter across the satellite signals travelling all the way from Bear Mountain.

“I miss you too,” Clarke says back, smiling.

“How are you? How’s Poughkeepsie?”

“It’s ... Poughkeepsie.”

“Fair enough.” Lexa’s breathy chuckle widens her smile.

“I love spending time with my parents but I’m also bored out of my mind. Abby and Jake Griffin’s idea of evening entertainment is slow dancing to old crooners.” As much as it endears Clarke to see her parents sliding around and twirling in the living room after dinner like they’re still lovestruck teenagers, their happiness made her long all the more for Lexa. “Makes third wheeling a little icky when they start looking at each other like I’m still not sat in the room and they’re about to try to give me a sibling.”

Clarke shudders at the horrifying thought of having to witness her parents naked. That’s when she escaped to her room to call Octavia.

Lexa laughs, another burst of delight that fans the flutter in Clarke’s chest. “You could’ve came with us, like I asked. Practically begged. We could have saved each other.”

“I know. I didn’t want to infringe on your Woods bonding time.”

“I wouldn’t have mind.”

“Maybe next time.” Seeing as this is an annual trip, it’s optimistic future planning on Clarke’s part that she would still be in the picture then.

“I’ll hold you to it,” Lexa says. After a beat of silence following Clarke’s hum, she switches gear. “So ...”

“So?”

“So, what are you wearing?”

Clarke bursts out laughing. “Babe, really?”

“You said you were bored!” Lexa defends. “Besides, I’m short on kindle, remember? Help a girl out. Warm me up.”

“That was terrible.”

“Come on. I’m horny and I need you.”

Clarke bites her lip. Two days without Lexa and her fingers has been a harder withdrawal than she anticipated.

“Won’t they overhear you?”

“No, haven’t you been listening? They’re busy out-masculining each other.”

“Are you serious? You really want to have _phone sex_?” She whispers the last part, weary of her own parents overhearing.

The line goes quiet, there’s some indistinct shuffling. The answer comes a second later in the form of a ding. When Clarke opens the text message, she drops the phone on her face. The image of Lexa’s abs and partially rolled down pants revealing the dip of her pelvis isn’t an unfamiliar sight; it’s the glistened fingers resting on top of the bare skin of her lower belly exposed by an open flannel shirt that’s a heart stopper.

“Clarke? Clarke, you still there?”

“I’m here,” she says breathless, picking the phone up again. “Did you already start?”

“You need to catch up.”

Clarke considers her next move. The music downstairs is still playing, the vocals of Otis Redding flitting up softly and letting her know her parents will be preoccupied for awhile more. It’s been two _long_ days since her last orgasm and this offered reprieve is more appealing by second as Lexa’s breathing, heavy with anticipation, fills her ear.

Maybe the distraction will help to take the edge off of her angst.

“How far behind am I?” She asks.

“Are you still clothed?”

“Yes.”

“Then, very.”

Clarke eyes the door of her bedroom, double checking that it’s locked. She sets her phone down and puts Lexa on speaker, freeing both hands to remove her shorts and top. She positions her phone camera at a flattering angle then sends the snapped picture to Lexa as her reply.

“Fuck, now that’s just unfair,” Lexa decries.

She knows it’s a good selfie, capturing a tasteful yet inviting glimpse of her cleavage straining against the hold of her bra; but to hear the desire in Lexa’s voice on seeing it, sends a rush to her core.

“You started it.”

“Would you judge me if I licked my screen?”

“Then I’d be a hypocrite.”

Instead of a reply, Clarke receives a followup picture. A cropped image framing the bottom half of Lexa’s face, lips in partial view, the peek of her tongue in focus. There’s nothing lewd or indiscreet about it but, the memory of what it’s capable of, has the same effect on Clarke as if she’s been gifted with a full nude.

“How much further ahead have you gotten?” She asks.

“Rub yourself for me,” Lexa instructs, a raggedness seeping into her breathing, a clear tonal shift that fast forwards their verbal teasing.

Clarke pushes a hand inside her pants to swipe through her already wet folds.

“Like that?”

It’s not as if Lexa can actually see, but Clarke is counting on telepathy to produce the same vivid image in Lexa’s mind that Clarke currently is beset with.

“Yeah, just like that.” Lexa encourages. “Imagine they’re my fingers, that I’m dipping into you.” Clarke whimpers. With how frequently they are intimate, it doesn’t tax her imagination too much to come up with the visualisation. They share a grateful moan as Clarke strokes then pushes inside. “That’s it. Just a little dip, enough for me to feel how much you want me.”

The narration works exceptionally well to work Clarke up faster than normal. The newness of having Lexa’s voice be the guiding hand increases her arousal tenfold, so turned on by her step by step instructions.

“I want you so much.”

“I know, baby, I know,” Lexa coos. “Keep going. Keep rubbing yourself and gathering your wetness.”

“Am I close to where you are now?” Clarke ventures, swallowing thickly around a drying throat, her breaths coming in shallower.

“Not yet, but soon. You’re going to have to go inside. Slowly, one finger first. Steady and slow so I can feel your heat tighten around me.” Lexa pauses for Clarke to follow through and, by the sound of it, catch her breath. “Am I inside you all the way?”

“Yeah,” Clarke chokes out, feeling the stretch as though it’s Lexa causing her walls to contract.

“Good girl,” Lexa praises. “Such a good girl. You think you can handle another? Can I fill you up some more?”

“Yes, please.” Clarke pushes in a second finger. She pumps a few times, moaning on each reentry. “You’re inside ... moving inside me. It’s so good.”

“Squeeze your breast for me. Every time you pull out, squeeze your breast. Pinch your nipple, then push back inside. Can you do that?”

“Y- yes.”

Coordinating the sequence as asked proves difficulty with her progressive lost of concentration but on hearing the slick sounds coming from the phone, Clarke redoubles her effort.

“G-good. You’re really close to where I am.”

“I’m going to come soon. Lex, I’m going to come, I’m going to ...”

“Faster, Clarke. Go faster,” Lexa commands, sounding to be taking her own advice with the quickness of her pants. Clarke speeds up, tries to match the tempo to the mutual shortness of their breaths. Her hand has never moved so fast of its own volition. “Now imagine my thumb on your clit, pressing down hard.”

Clarke doesn’t have to imagine this particular step, she’s already doing it.

“Imagine,” Lexa continues, a lower lilt to her tone and what Clarke can audibly make out as her licking her lip, “I’m pinching your nipple, rolling it; I’m buried inside of you, pushing and pulling your wet heat as it clings to my fingers; my thumb is rubbing mad circles on your clit, which is swollen and throbbing under my touch.”

“Oh god.”

“Then I’m kissing you, just as hard and deep as my fingers are working.”

“I’m so close, I’m so close, so close,” Clarke chants in rapid succession. On the other end of the line, Lexa sounds to be in a similar state of nearness.

“Will you come for me?”

“I’m coming, Lexa, I’m coming. Fuck, I’m coming so hard.”

Clarke buries her head into her pillow as she fucks herself to completion, dampening the sound of her release.

When she re-emerges, it’s to find her bed soaked and Lexa trailing off the end of coming too.

“Sweetie, everything okay?” Clarke suddenly hears her father ask through the door, followed by worried knocking that she can’t be sure for how long it’s been going on. “I heard screaming.”

“Shit,” she says to Lexa, who’s broken into giggles overhearing his concern, “shhhhh.” Clarke covers the phone then shouts across the way. “Fine, Dad! Just watching a scary movie.”

Her dad accepts the lie after a moment of Clarke holding her breath and ignoring Lexa’s laughter crackling through the receiver. He leaves with a hesitant, “Goodnight, enjoy,” informing Clarke that he and her mother are heading to bed.

“Not funny,” Clarke lambasts following his departure, though there’s no bite. “It’s giving me flashbacks to highschool Clarke discovering herself after discovering his collection of Raquel Welch posters and having to hide it from him.”

“Oooh, Raquel, good and classy choice,” Lexa commends. “Mine was the pink Power Ranger.”

Clarke laughs. “I should’ve guessed.”

“Hey, Amy Jo Johnson was hot!” Lexa defends. Clarke can hear if not see her pout. “Every time she bent down into her pose, my heart leapt toward the screen.”

“Is this your way of asking me to wear pink spandex for Halloween?” Clarke teases.

“Would you?” There’s far too much excitement in Lexa’s voice for her to be kidding.

“Maybe.”

“Don’t make promises you can’t keep, Clarke. It’ll break my heart.”

“I’m sure you’ll recover.” Clarke smiles into the phone, going quieter at the mention of breaking promises. Wishing in the moment that Lexa wasn’t so good at keeping the one she made to Clarke to not fall in love with her. “Besides, as very recent history shows, I seem to have a problem saying no to you.”

“I really do miss you,” Lexa says, softer too. “I can’t wait to see you again. I’ve been doing some thinking in the woods. There’s something I have to tell you.”

Her unexpected admission makes Clarke both nervous and hopeful. Maybe Octavia is right. It’s not one-sided. Maybe things aren’t so unrequited.

“There’s something I have to tell you, too.”

Clarke wipes her hand on the sheets and resettles on the bed against the headboard.

“Ok, we’ll talk later.” A yawn comes through before Lexa urges, “Stay on the line until I fall asleep?”

“There’s nowhere else I would rather be.”

—

The rest of Fall goes by faster than Clarke can control. Deadlines and project disruptions have meant they haven’t found time to properly talk, mostly falling asleep in each other’s arms when together. September rolls into October. Thanksgiving happens in a flash. Pumpkin pie and movies into the night and then sex into the morning being all Clarke remembers of November.

As Clarke’s art and Lexa’s building progress toward their respective goals, exhaustion on both their ends make them clamour for the quiet when together, more attentive in nonverbal ways to the other. Away from the canvas and the construction site, they nest and fill the space in between with a domestic kind of bliss that’s aching for permanence.

By month’s end, with the looming expiration of their arrangement, Clarke needs to say something about the extent of her attachment. The lump in her throat grows the closer they get to the date without any resolution in sight save for the expectation that Lexa will leave, returning to the UK and taking Clarke’s heart with her.

The future is a haze, post December a giant question mark. But whatever happens in January and beyond, Clarke can’t and doesn’t want to imagine without Lexa in the picture.

While not yet expressed in speech, there’s every indication otherwise that Lexa feels the same. The soft morning smiles, the late evening laughs, the tulips that regularly appear, the blanket that wraps wordlessly around her shoulders during her overnight painting sprints, the freshly ground Peruvian coffee that awaits hours later with the rise of sun; these and so many other small gestures provide mounting evidence to bolster Clarke’s confidence.

It’s that surge that propels Clarke across town into Manhattan at this late hour to stand in front of Lexa’s door, unable to wait any longer. Recognising her, reception had let Clarke into the apartment building without hesitation. Clarke waved her thanks and spent a nervous ride up the elevator rehearsing her speech, the same one gone over quietly in her head in the cab ride in a daze of flickering city lights. The floor numbers of the elevator counter ticks upward unseen, Clarke’s concentration wholly on the turn of phrase best arranged to let Lexa know what she means to Clarke. What she’s been responsible for in these past months: the rampant butterflies, the flurry of her artistic activities, an appreciation for cranes and a tolerance of noise-rattling machines named Kelly, a renewed purpose in grocery shopping, a new perspective from the inside of love. How the changes large and small to Clarke’s life, Lexa’s imprint is indelible.

Clarke’s entire speech revolves around the object in her hand, which she’s been twisting anxiously, a reminder of what Lexa has already left behind—of where they started and what’s at stake.

The reality of Lexa’s departure and her home being elsewhere far away from New York limits what Clarke can hope to happen between them; nonetheless, Clarke wants to ask for an extension of their contract. Wants more time. Needs to know if that’s an option. If Clarke, as more than a friend, is an option.

She needs to know if her feelings are reciprocated or if she’s in this alone. She is bursting to get the words out. By the time the door finally opens, long minutes after knocking, they can’t be contained,

“Lexa, I lo—”

but her confession falls flat to unheard ears at who answers on the other side. Clarke rubs her eyes and checks the unit number to confirm she has the right apartment.

A look of surprise then a smile of recognition swims into her vision when it clears. While it’s Lexa’s sweater and Lexa’s sleep shorts, even Lexa’s mismatched socks standing before Clarke, it is not Lexa who greets her.

“You must be Clarke.”

Too shocked to reply, Clarke dumbly nods and shakes the offered hand, the hard hat under her arm falls to the ground with the shift of movement. On impact with the ground, it makes a sound that closely resembles the crack of Clarke’s heart.

The lump in her throat is suddenly unbearable. She knows what’s coming next before the words—three different words—reach her.

“Hi, I’m Costia.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, I lied. Maybe, some feelings were involved. Thanks for reading :) One more to go! In case there's any doubt about the ending, I'm team clexa, aka team feelings _and_ cuddles.  
> [@theproseofnight](https://theproseofnight.tumblr.com)


	3. of brevity and gravity

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title comes from one of many lovely conversations with @mopeytropey. Of brevity and gravity: falling for someone in a short amount of time.

**_***_ **

_— VII. The complication —_

“Nice to finally meet you.”

Still bowled over from shock, Clarke is unable to return the niceties. She had shaken Costia’s hand on autopilot but otherwise, currently, has no grasp on what the rest of her body is doing beyond her mouth possibly hanging open. If her head is nodding, Clarke can’t tell.

She is also in a state unfit to parse what Costia means by, _finally_.

Her heart is in pieces and she is on the verge of tears, bleary-eyed from the effort to not let them fall.

It’s late, past midnight, and Lexa’s ex-girlfriend—or _current_ girlfriend—is standing at the door where Clarke expected Lexa to be.

She considers walking away. To retrace her steps. Rewind this night. Curl up in bed.

“Cos, why are you up? Is it the jetlag?” Clarke hears in the background. Her stomach bottoms out at the sound of Lexa’s voice, groggy from sleep. A war of emotions surfaces from the familiarity of that timbre, soft and warm, and the disparity that it is not addressed to her.

“Darling, I think your _friend_ is here to see you,” Costia fills in, turning her head in the direction of somewhere inside the apartment. The particular emphasis on the title implies an inside joke that Clarke has no time to unpack because the sound of padding footsteps gets closer, then Lexa is by her side before Clarke can school her runaway emotions. Lexa’s eyes brighten when they land on Clarke, her whole face blooms wide. The look of happiness is at odds with the heartbreak Clarke feels, which she must be doing a poor job of hiding because Lexa’s smile immediately drops.

“Clarke, what’s wrong?” Lexa asks, worried. “Everything okay? What are you doing here?”

Clarke’s scrambled brain is clawing for purchase. She doesn’t really have a good answer to those questions—any question—in this very second. Before Costia appeared, it would have been a version of, _I’m in love with you and can’t hold it in anymore_.

Now, it’s a bit of a miracle that Clarke can hold it together at all, let alone string a semblance of a sentence. Instead, _what is she doing here?_ is the comeback that flashes overhead neon brighter than the warm glow backlighting the two figures in front of her.

When Clarke doesn’t answer, Lexa reaches out for her arm. Normally a centring touch, Clarke recoils at the near brush and takes a stumbling step backward.

Hurt and confusion flicker across Lexa’s face at her reaction, brow furrowing. Her consternation turns into sober understanding when she notes the meaningful glance Clarke steals Costia’s way.

“You didn’t get my message.” It’s phrased more as a statement—a soft realisation—than a question.

Lexa opens her mouth to explain but the seeming struggle for words and her ensuing silence say a lot more. The gears of her mind appear to be actively turning yet they produce no sound.

Clarke stares, confounded.

Their lengthy, mute exchange is interrupted by Costia’s chuckle. She pushes at Lexa’s shoulder and nudges her aside to make room for the door to open wider.

“Lex, stop being a savage. Invite the girl in,” Costia enjoins, a fond exasperation at Lexa’s perceived lack of manners. Her pronunciation of words, the drop of ‘r’ especially, suddenly snaps reality back in place. It reminds Clarke of the geographic difference separating them. The gaping British-American gulf of an ocean that has been wedged in between her and Lexa out of nowhere.

At an elbow prompt by Costia, Lexa steps back fully to let her through. Without warning, before Clarke has taken one step past the threshold, the distance closes abruptly. Costia envelops her into a hug. She can’t find her bearings, overwhelmed by the unexpected welcoming. Lexa gingerly peels Costia’s fingers off her back. When Lexa’s hand skims her side, the accidental graze sends a disorienting jolt.

“Sorry, I’m a hugger.” Costia’s apology for breaking norms is followed by a more customary, and given the circumstances, somewhat out of place, adherence to social etiquette, as she turns toward the kitchen. “I’ll make us some tea, yeah? Was about to put the kettle on for myself anyway. Could really use a cuppa.”

“Clarke,” Lexa gently implores.

“Oh! I’ve brought digestives, real biscuits which Lexa dearly misses.” Costia goes on, back turned, not reading the room and the thickening tension. “Thank god they were in my carryon. A bit crumbly now I’d imagine, but just as well after the brilliant day I’ve had. Business class isn’t all it’s cracked up to be when I’m stuck in the middle seat between two tossers who think an eight hour chat about their portfolios would make for riveting in-flight entertainment. My luggage is lost somewhere in LaGuardia’s labyrinth or already halfway to Chicago but my stock options are sorted. Anyway, I know Lexa is obsessed with her camomile. What about you, Clarke?”

 _What about me?_ is a question to which Clarke would also like to know the answer.

Clarke stares dumbfounded, her stance on herbal and black teas waffles more uncertain than her new stance on surprise visits.

It’s difficult to know what position to take with the current situation. Where to go from here and what to think of Costia’s affability or her insider knowledge of Lexa’s preferences. From the sound of it, Costia must still be on London time, in which case it would soon be her breakfast hour.

Tea and biscuits is the farthest thing from Clarke’s mind at the moment.

She can feel Lexa’s eyes on her but refrains from meeting them, choosing instead to concentrate on forming words and coming to a decision. Caffeine after nightfall isn’t wise, then again, it’s unlikely she will get any sleep tonight.

“I prefer coffee,” Clarke finally speaks up a beat later, an attempt to clear her throat is ineffectual at removing the boulder there. Her voice sounds distant to her own ears.

“Right, Lexa mentioned something about orange notes,” Costia says easily over her shoulder while rummaging through the cupboards. She examines a brown bag, reading from the label. “Is Peruvian medium roast okay?”

Clarke wants to reply, _Of course it’s okay, I’m the one who bought the damn beans._ Opting to play pretend instead like this isn’t killing her, she tries for a smile she does not feel. Pushes aside pain in favour of politeness. “That would be lovely, thank you.”

Lexa silently leads them to the couch. Her movements are stiff plainly made rigid by the realisation of the appearance of circumstances weighing down Clarke’s mood.

They sit on the couch, some good several feet away from each other upholding its ends. Lexa’s hands twitch in her lap, looking like they itch to reach out but holding firm out of respect for the distinct boundary set by Clarke’s hands that are purposefully tucked away, safe under her legs. The fabric of the sofa prickles against her skin, an uncomfortable scratch not felt before but that nonetheless anchors her from reaching out too.

Like this, they are so far apart from where they were yesterday, cuddled together with no room leftover while hands and lips pressed their bodies ever closer. Clarke aches for that closeness now, at the same time fights the instinct to run away and put as much physical and emotional distance between them as possible.

She continues to avert Lexa’s gaze which has been unsuccessful in its repeat attempts to lock with hers. Clarke can’t look yet, unsure of what she will or wants to find in Lexa’s eyes. The burn behind her own eyes is stinging, tears seconds from welling over, and if she were to chance a glimpse at the green colour that’s occupied her mind and canvas these weeks—usually brightly hued and a visual essay of verdant intensities—it would be the beginning of the end. She needs to give her heart time to regulate, a near impossibility with Lexa’s proximity.

Some minutes later, after firing up the kettle and prepping _Clarke’s_ French press, Costia walks out of sight to retrieve the biscuits from her luggage. Silence blankets the room with her momentary departure. A loudness of unspoken thoughts and flickering cross-wires fill in her absence.

“Clarke,” Lexa tries again, more gentle than she has a right to, an edge of desperation colouring her voice, “look at me, please.”

Out of stalwart pride, Clarke refuses. Lexa doesn’t deserve her tears.

Looking around the apartment instead, Clarke realises for the first time since her many visits how impersonal Lexa’s place actually is. The executive rental unit is furnished with all the usual bells and whistles of high end modern conveniences but it decidedly lacks the warmth that Clarke has come to associate with Lexa. Potted plants on the window sill, a strewn of books spread about on the coffee table, and an errant blanket over the back of the couch, are the spare cues of her lived-in influence. What once felt intimate, a space of shared naps and attentive touches, now seems spartan to the point of clinical.

With rosy glasses off, things look different. Foreign. The minimalist, ascetic decor is a striking contrast to the lack of moderation characterising their months together. She wonders what else she has been seeing that wasn’t really there. Wasn’t what it seemed.

Giving in to brave a new perspective, Clarke finally chances a glance at Lexa and braces for the apparition of a stranger. Her chest cracks to find the same beautiful girl, only infinitely more nervous, jaw tight and hands twisting. Lexa’s attention is focused intently on the spot on the carpet where wine was spilt when Clarke surprised her last week with a new lingerie set. The red stain was soon forgotten after more red lace fielded her vision. Lexa had proceeded to communicate how much she appreciated the outfit, first through kisses then a drawing out of lips labour across the length of Clarke’s body. An extended, exhaustive thank you. Beyond their usual breathless pursuit of pleasure, though, it was the closest to making love out of anything they have done to date. Lexa’s name spilling from her tongue over and again, a sacred and secret hymn, was the closest Clarke came to spilling her heart out and finding answer in love’s prayer.

With Costia’s return to the kitchen catching in Clarke’s peripheral vision, her reappearance pours cold water over the memory. She wills it out of mind.

“Clarke, I can explain,” Lexa insists. “It’s not what it looks like.”

“And what does it look like, Lexa?” Clarke asks, failing to keep the bite and pain out of her question.

From where Clarke is sitting, it looks an awful lot like she is intruding on private time between Lexa and her girlfriend. Costia is obliviously prepping their drinks in a familiar way as if hosting is a regular occurrence for the couple. Clarke feels like a guest. An acquaintance.

“It’s complicated,” Lexa responds and sounds flustered. “I, um ...”

As Lexa is grasping for words, Clarke catches Costia’s eye, and receives a kind smile. Costia tilts her head, curious of Clarke’s staring. Truly taking Costia in for the first time, it would be unsurprising to discover she may have been a former model who’s graced the cover of British Vogue. A natural beauty accentuated by pronounced, doll-like features. Pretty is an understatement. Lexa’s Columbia sweater hangs off her slim frame in a cosy and attractive way that, under different circumstances, would be difficult to hate. It’s an effortless look matched by the home aesthetic Lexa’s sporting that’s often made flips of her stomach; tousled hair bound up into a top-bun, librarian eyeglasses, a thread bare tee and, most cruelly, Clarke‘s joggers that run well short on Lexa’s longer legs but which hasn’t stopped her from claiming them as hers.

The discordant image rankles her, heart clenching at their domesticity. It delivers a devastating sucker punch to whatever hopes she held for tonight and for the rest of their time together.

“You know what, I can’t do this.”

Clarke stands abruptly. Turns on her heels.

She gets no farther than half a step.

“Wait, wait,” Lexa pleads, panic setting in her voice. On her feet in an instant, she grabs Clarke by the wrist to stop her momentum. Her reflexes are too fast that the motion causes Clarke to ricochet full body back against her chest.

Arms reactively wrap around her middle to break her stumble, absorb the impact. Lexa’s unique scent that Clarke loves so much invades her space. It overwhelms.

For no other idea of how to regain her losing composure, sadness turns to anger. She feels impotent anger for a cornered situation of her own making. Clarke pushes away from Lexa’s arms, rougher than the gentle care of her handler, only to lean back in a second later and, pointing towards Costia’s since turned back, whisper-yells in an attempt to keep her voice and grief down, “ _That_ is complicated. And it’s not what I signed up for.”

She blithely overlooks the fact that this is exactly what she signed up for: being a third party to an established, _open_ relationship, an added complication to an already complicated arrangement.

“I haven’t lied to you,” Lexa says, surety writ over a knitted expression. Voice dropping in volume too. “I’ve been honest about who Costia is from day one.”

“Really?” Clarke asks incredulous on a humourless scoff. Setting aside that ‘day one’ is a stretch indicative of Lexa’s elastic notion of time, if honesty was truly part of their contract then Clarke wouldn’t have walked into this apartment, into Costia, blindsided. “Oh, so have I got it completely wrong somehow?” The dam breaks, questions bursting forth like spitfire. Little of logic flows out of her. “We don’t have three more weeks? You’re not getting back together already? I haven’t been a placeholder all along, someone to keep your bed warm until she comes back? Friends with benefits, but only for you? Were you ever really single?”

Clarke is unraveling.

The strain to keep her volume and anguish down is nothing in comparison to the effort it’s taking not to be swallowed whole by the canyon separating head and heart. It’s a good thing Clarke has an especially loud kettle to keep the loudness of her dismantling out of Costia’s hearing range.

Chest heaving, Clarke gasps for air. She hasn’t felt this unmoored since their heated exchange on Lexa’s construction site.

“I’m your six months, right?” She tries for a smile but by how stricken Lexa looks, a reflection of Clarke’s inner turmoil, it must not work. It feels as tremulous as the shake in her hands she can’t control. “Just a drop in the ocean.”

The parroted words, meant to reaffirm the manifestation of their plans, work instead to deepen the lines on Lexa’s face. Likely pity, Clarke thinks, the only plausible explanation for her pained expression.

Casting a glance to Costia, it’s apparent now that the feelings aren’t mutual, the six months not holding the same meaning. Love not reciprocal. Lexa will hop on a plane, return to what she had— _has_ with Costia—and continue on with her life like this half year hasn’t changed her in the irrevocable way it has for Clarke.

Clarke steps back, leaving Lexa’s hold. For the first time, her touch is unwanted, burning in a way Clarke is certain she won’t be able to recover from.

“Not just a drop.” Lexa shakes her head, refusing the summary. “Clarke, I ...” her voice cracks, outwardly aggrieved at not finding the right words before arriving at, “you’re you.”

Clarke does not know what to make of that, what to do with them. She needs to leave now before an imminent breakdown happens in plain sight of Lexa’s girlfriend. She needs to gracefully bow out.

Clarke nods numbly.

Folded hands and broken words and clouded eyes, are not how this should have gone. Not how mutual love should be. Not how late night confessions are meant to go. She’s unable to stay and watch her heart break piece by piece. Throat tightening, her voice breaks on the next and final question,

“Was I just a good fuck to you?”

The words taste like ash in Clarke’s mouth. Which is fairly the same shade Lexa’s face becomes, drained of its colour. It confuses Clarke why Lexa looks wounded and paper thin fragile against the cinder blocks of her words, like it would have been a greater kindness to slap her.

“Is that what you think? No, Clarke,” Lexa adamantly denies after recovering, frustration evident in her defensive reply and clenched jaw. “I mean, yes. But not like that. Not _just_ that. It’s not a lie. Costia’s not—”

“Fine, let’s play a game,” Clarke suggests, interrupting on seeing Costia come round with their drinks and goodies, raising her volume intentionally loud enough for her to hear. She wipes at the tears in the corner of her eyes.

Costia sets the tray down, unaware of the risen conflict. Gesturing to Clarke’s mug, she asks innocently, “Milk and sugar? I couldn’t find cream.”

To both their surprise, Lexa stomps away to the kitchen and returns wordless with a bottle of whisky to splash a dollop of amber liquid into the mug. Practically wrestling the milk jug from Costia’s hold that the milk jostles over the lip, she takes over its pouring, and adds one brown sugar cube with deliberate show. The teaspoon is then stirred with accelerated purpose, metal clinking against ceramic. Once finished preparing the cup exactly as Clarke likes to indulge when needing a hit of comfort, she holds it out in testy offer, a challenge in the tightness of her grip for Clarke to refuse the thoughtful gesture.

Reluctantly, Clarke takes the cup from her, also without a word.

They separately, silently, go to sit back down on the couch. Unconsciously closer than before. Costia stares, mouth agape. Clarke understands little of the precise mechanics involved in watching tennis, but that’s what Costia’s head appears to be doing, volleying back and forth between the two of them.

“Uh, okay, that wasn’t _weird_ at all,” Costia comments, drawing out the word with extra emphasis in Lexa’s direction. “Must be an Americanism,” she concludes under her breath while tending to the tray, righting the milk jug that Lexa had placed back down with extra force. Looking up again, she inquires, “What’s this about a game, Lex?”

“Two truths and a lie,” Clarke replies on their behalf, crossing her arms, gaze squarely on Lexa. “You first, _Lex_.”

She lifts her chin, daring Lexa to keep up with the pretense. The nickname is said with not the usual amount of affection, rather a cut of competitiveness.

“Ooh, this sounds like fun.” Costia lights up. She makes Lexa a cup of tea, with practised ease and less fanfare, “Here you go, darling,” and then fixes herself one before opening the packet of biscuits.

The rough, crinkling sound of the wrapper is a welcomed distraction against the softness of _darling_ that settles heavy in Clarke’s ears.

It hurts, but she temps it down with the burn of coffee she swallows on too quick of a gulp.

Lexa sighs, deflating. “Clarke,” she tries to appeal to her reasonable side. “This is not how I wanted to tell you.”

Clarke doesn’t budge, lifts her chin higher. Glare further withering.

Rather than shrink from it, Lexa crosses her arms. Doesn’t back away from the challenge. Determination sets in her jaw instead. She sustains eye contact, though there’s significantly more softness in her defiance then the daggers Clarke is shooting.

“ _Fine_. One, I hate avocado,” Lexa starts to enumerate, to which Clarke rolls her eyes at the obvious lie and Costia makes a noise of agreement around a crunch of biscuit.

“The fruit trader at Broadway market in Hackney would have something to say about that.” Costia laughs, patting Lexa’s knee, looking endeared.

The otherwise lovely sound rings hollow as Clarke steels her nerves for what the two ‘truths’ could be, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Focusing on what comes next helps Clarke to avert her gaze from where Costia’s hand continues to linger.

Lexa ignores Costia’s dig, an odd look washes over her face. She moves infinitesimally closer to Clarke, about to reach out for her hand but retracts it at the last second, seeming to think better of it.

”Two, you’re right. I’m not single.” Clarke takes a sharp intake of air, chest tightening. Before she can react further to this truth, Lexa continues. “I haven’t been since an angry artist yelled at me and I accidentally dumped coffee on her three times. I’ve been very attached from the moment she stole my hard hat and never returned it.

“Three, my heart is currently pounding out of my chest afraid you’d walk out that door thinking you haven’t meant anything to me, and not hearing what I’ve been trying to say for awhile but have obviously been doing a piss poor job at communicating,” Lexa says in one release of breath, “which is, you are so much more to me than a good fuck.” Ignoring the choking noise Costia makes in startled response, she pauses for a longer intake of air. “Because, the truth is, I’m in love with you.”

The words knock the breath from her.

Clarke stares. Unblinking.

Oh.

 _Oh_.

Crickets can be heard all the way from her parents house in Poughkeepsie. The air punched from her lungs is sucked out of the room too. Her heart works overtime, oscillating between elation and uncertainty and extreme confusion.

Her gaze immediately darts to Costia for a reaction to Lexa’s confession of feelings for someone else, right in front of her. While the admission blunts the sharpness of pain Clarke has felt since the encounter at the door, in its place is bewilderment.

Costia, on the other hand, doesn’t appear shocked. She does, however, smack Lexa on the shoulder. Hastily wiping crumbs from her mouth, Costia blurts, “Christ, don’t tell me you hadn’t told her yet!?”

Lexa winces and rubs her shoulder, glaring at Costia. “Was the violence necessary?”

“Yes, you daft lesbian,” Costia assails, looking equal parts askance, flummoxed and irate. “You’re such a gorilla. Didn’t we talk about you talking about it with Clarke, ages ago?”

“I’ve been trying! I didn’t want to scare her away.”

Head spinning, Clarke watches as the pair argue, ostensibly forgetting her presence.

“Lexa! It’s one am, and your girlfriend meets me for the first time in your flat and I’m sat here wearing your clothes and looking stunning despite having been on my feet for the last twenty hours. I’d say that’s rather scary. Are you proper mad?”

Lexa glares harder. “Cos, not helping.”

“Apparently, neither has been those motivational tapes you made me listen to while on FaceTime,” Costia deadpans. “Where’s your phone?”

“Why?”

“So we can file a consumer complaint and demand a refund for the obviously ineffective, Ten Days to Tell a Girl You Love Her, in Plain English, app.”

Lexa looks ready to punch Costia.

“What’s going on?” Clarke intervenes in the bickering. She’s tripped up by the mixed signals, and doubly, still hung up on Costia’s reference to _her_ as Lexa’s girlfriend. “You love me?”

Looking to Costia for reinforcement and receiving a supportive nod, Lexa exhales and then repeats, holding Clarke’s gaze, “Incredibly, madly, wildly so. I love you.”

The words are tender and warm but bring no further clarity the second time said.

“I don’t understand,” Clarke says, grappling to make sense of them as she struggles to catch up to the turn of events.

“She’s an idiot,” Costia supplies, a succinct summary. Dismissing Lexa’s answering scowl with a wave of hand, she rises to excuse herself. “I’ll let you two talk. I’ll be in the bedroom, _not_ eavesdropping.” Gathering her tea and plate of biscuits, she makes a graceful exit. Before she’s out of the room though, Costia turns to Clarke to say, “Maybe after Lexa gets her shit together, you and I can have a real cup between us.”

Clarke nods and offers a first, genuine, smile. Costia returns it kindly and, after giving Lexa one last scolding but supportive look, leaves them to their mess.

“How about that long overdue talk now?” Lexa suggests, quieter, minutes later, hands still wringing.

Given the mental lag behind on processing the substance of Lexa’s truths, the best option would be for Clarke to decline, get some distance and rest, and revisit the subject in the clear light of morning when she has a better grasp of her emotions. Instead, she finds herself agreeing, if only so she can assuage the last of lingering irrational jealousy over Costia’s presence.

Despite it being her idea, Lexa looks petrified at the prospect of further explaining herself. She worries her bottom lip.

“I’m so confused, Lexa.” Clarke initiates when she doesn’t continue. “If Costia is here, then that means ...”

“I’m constipated,” Lexa blurts out.

“Excuse me?”

“Fuck, ah no, that’s not what I meant. My bowel system is fine, I get enough daily fibre as you know, maybe too much—”

“Lexa, breathe,” Clarke interrupts her would-be ramble. She doesn’t realise she’s the one now reaching out until Lexa’s gaze falls to her hand on her arm. The anchoring touch is effective to calm them both.

“Anya says I get this constipated look when I’m overthinking or, as she calls it, internally emoting,” Lexa clarifies. “I’m sorry if I’ve been hard to read.”

Softening, Clarke squeezes her arm in dawned understanding. “Tell me what happened.”

Lexa gets up to sit on the coffee table, facing Clarke directly.

“I did try to call you earlier to let you know Costia arrived late this evening, a surprise. Airport pickup was a nightmare, there was baggage delay, and traffic on the bridge was horrible on the way back, some sort of accident. By the time we got here, I thought you were already asleep and I didn’t want to wake you. They’re still sorting out her lost checked bags—the ticket change for the layover likely confused things. She borrowed my clothes for the night,” Lexa lets out all in one go. “I left a message and was going to call you again in the morning.”

Clarke remembers registering the missed call and intending to return it but in her rush over here she hadn’t taken notice of the voicemail notification.

The backstory explains the shared clothes, but not why Costia is here, so Clarke’s relief is tepid. Reading her hesitancy, Lexa expands.

“Costia is an interior designer. Her office has been promoting this major hotel project internationally, which a colleague was due to present their work at the Design Show in Chicago, but he fell ill. She had big news she wanted to tell me in person that couldn’t wait until I got back to London as originally scheduled. Cos volunteered to fill in the coworker’s place and jumped at the opportunity to take an extended three day layover in New York. I only learned of her arrival when she called me from LaGuardia.”

“What big news?” Clarke pries, and despite signs pointing elsewhere, is scared Costia might have come to some sort of grand revelation about their relationship sooner than their agreed-upon deadline and needed to reassert her first dips rights.

“Costia’s engaged.” When Clarke’s eyes widen comically and then go swiftly to Lexa’s left hand, Lexa immediately clarifies, “To someone else.”

“That’s fast,” Clarke comments.

“When you know, you know,” Lexa repeats from a previous conversation, annunciating slowly to let the import of her words take hold.

Clarke isn’t sure what she knows at this point, but she does feel her resistance to Lexa eroding the more Lexa speaks. Lexa picks up on her flagging opposition and pushes on.

“Costia and I didn’t have that knowing with each other, not explicitly anyway. That’s what our separation and this distance was intended to explore. We both wanted to, and knew, that we could make our relationship work but we had reached a point of needing to think hard about the possibility that it might not. Our open arrangement was an attempt to consider an alternative path without the other, under the premise that no matter what, we would come back together at the end of my time here in New York and make a decision _together_ on how to move forward, whether in the same or a different direction.”

Clarke nods, indicating she’s still listening when Lexa pauses, her eyes scanning Clarke’s face for a reaction or any signs of understanding what’s being implied.

Her hand goes to rest on Clarke’s knee, a tentative touch that Clarke allows.

Lexa elaborates, “Costia found that path with Gaia. They’ve known each other professionally for years but it wasn’t until she and Gaia unexpectedly shared the same bucket seat in a Ferris wheel while Costia was on a weekend break in Blackpool that something clicked. They’ve been together since the summer. Gaia proposed last month during bonfire night. It’s a UK thing where they have fireworks to commemorate when some guy tried to burn down Parliament back in the 1600s.”

As much as Clarke appreciates the tangent history lesson, she’s still stuck on present day.

“Apparently, Costia has been sitting on the news for weeks, and because of our pact to not make major decisions till the end, she hadn’t actually given Gaia a formal answer yet, wanting to wait until she told me. Gaia is aware of our arrangement too and has been patient about it, but Costia realised she wasn’t being fair to either of us. Especially after my original departure was postponed until the end of the month, she couldn’t hold off any longer. Hence the last minute trip, which she saw as an opening to not delay telling me anymore.”

The second to last tidbit comes as surprising info. Clarke had assumed Lexa’s initial itinerary to be back by December meant the end of the month, not the beginning. Either her math has been off or Lexa’s disclosure of the schedule change must never have taken root. So consumed by their days rolling one into another, she hadn’t clocked the extra three weeks gained as bonus time.

“When did you change your flight?”

“After our first Sunday in the park.” Lexa says, an affectionate smile gracing her features. Softly admits, “I needed more Sundays.”

Clarke nods and spends a minute trying to take note of all the asterisks and annotations appended to Lexa’s actions and their time together. Biting her lip in thought, she weakly argues, “Costia calls you, darling,” a feeble attempt to poke holes in Lexa’s increasingly water-tight explanation.

“She’s an East Londoner. They call everyone darling. I’m _luv_ according to my green beans reseller and about every second other trader.”

Catching Clarke off guard, Lexa kneels in front of her. Looks deeply into her eyes.

There’s a glimmer in her own set that makes the world stop spinning.

“I haven’t lied, Clarke,” Lexa avers. “Costia and I are not together. We haven’t been officially for over eight months, and have not been physical in almost just as long before that. She’s happy with Gaia. And I’m happy with—”

The ‘you’ is left hanging at Clarke’s eager interruption. She needs to know.

“Where do I fit into this picture?”

A hand reaches up, waits for permission and when granted with a wordless nod, cradles her face. Pulse racing, Clarke leans into the soft touch as a thumb brushes gently across her cheek. Ceding the last ground, Clarke opens up her stance and Lexa immediately accepts the invitation, scoots forward and tucks in between her widened legs.

“You’re all I see.”

Clarke sucks in a breath at the simplicity of her answer.

“Ever since you pushed your way onto my construction site, I haven’t been able to look away.”

Unequipped to fight Lexa’s softness, the tension leaks from Clarke’s shoulders enough to joke, “Maybe you need a new prescription.”

Lexa chuckles, cutely and self-consciously pushes up the bridge of her glasses, her eyes crinkling with affection. A further softening. She brushes an errant strand of hair away from Clarke’s face. “Not if this is what’s in front of me.”

“Why didn’t you tell me any of this earlier?”

“You were a promise meant to be broken,” Lexa says instead, gaze falling to Clarke’s lips. Clarke loses the battle to not swoon. “I was falling for you even as I was vowing not to.”

“So, you are a liar,” Clarke teases, wishing the butterflies in her stomach would keep quiet so she could put on a semblance of immunity to Lexa’s charm.

Lexa breaks into a bashful grin, an oddly shy smile like she’s been hanging onto a secret.

“All cards on the table?”

“Please.”

“There was one, tiny, lie in the beginning. The headphones I gave you?” Clarke’s eyebrows scrunch at the non-sequitur, but she nods anyway. Lexa continues, “I didn’t have a spare set. It took me ages to find the perfect balance of function and aesthetic. When I bumped into you at the café, it was so unexpected that you’d even humour sitting with me after I spilled coffee all over you. Even more unexpected, sometime during our chat, I had said something supposedly funny that made you laugh. It felt unbelievably necessary to hear that laugh again, especially since you’d only ever given me scowls after our confrontation. You were such an angry lion.”

Lexa breaks to smooth out the forehead lines formed by Clarke’s displeasure at the description. A brave kiss to her forehead follows, succeeding to pacify.

“I wanted to give you something, anything, that would make you less mad at me and Kelly. The headphones were a peace offering, but really, it was whatever pretext to make you think better of me. Early on, it felt important you didn’t hate me.”

Clarke can’t fathom ever hating Lexa, not with the way her free hand has moved to Clarke’s hip and kneads tenderness into her skin. Not with the way Lexa presses in closer like the gap between them is an offence to her very existence.

“If you lied about the headphones, how can I trust that you don’t hate avocado?” Clarke asks, playfulness in her tone, albeit there’s an undercurrent of uncertainty about the other two truths.

“As much as you can trust that I aggressively dislike coffee and only tolerated it because I couldn’t stay away from you.

“Since the café, I haven’t been able to control any of my compulsions when it comes to you. Like I said, things had already stalled with Costia for awhile before you and I met. Although we agreed to take the break as an opportunity to see other people, I hadn’t entertained the idea seriously, not really. Nothing more beyond maybe a hookup, if even. It didn’t cross my mind when I became friends with this amazing artist who talks about colour the way I feel about coarsed bricks, that she’d be non-platonically interested in me or what I have to say about pink stone. My only thought was I wanted to spend more time with you. It’s incredibly irritating to my sense of self preservation.”

Clarke lets out a small chuckle and entwines their fingers on her lap, watching as Lexa absently plays with them. Her thoughts are running a mile a minute but she stays quiet to let Lexa continue, savouring this account of their short history from Lexa’s perspective. The circuitous response to the initial question of Lexa’s silence on the subject offers more insights than Clarke had hoped for.

“And it’s been like that from the get go. This unabating desire to be with you, near you, in whatever way, shape or form,” Lexa confesses. The involuntary movement of her hand, which had taken to lightly rubbing up and down Clarke’s thigh, supports the statement. “It kept ratcheting up. Our first kiss? That time in the hallway? I’ve never wanted to kiss someone so badly. Then, after a taste, I needed more. Much, much more. Everything happened so organically between us, and we became one thing then another without me noticing. The sex is phenomenal. You’re just ... really hot. Making you come, the way you take me in and allow me to take you, has got to be the most exquisite thing in the world.”

Clarke blushes. A deep reddening at the words and the memories that cross her mind. Lexa strokes higher up on her thigh, a shadow of lust falling thick between them at her dilated pupils.

“But beyond that, it quickly went from needing more to wanting more. I was greedy for whatever you were willing to give. I have zero chill, apparently, according to Anya.”

It’s mutual but to hear it vocalised under such definitive terms, affirms Clarke hasn’t been alone in this heaviness of want.

“You didn’t say anything,” Clarke reminds of the original inquiry, wishing she’d known this sooner. Although, as Octavia had so bluntly pointed out, the signs were fairly clear.

“I’m an architect not a lawyer. You seemed content with our casual agreement and I didn’t know how to revoke our contract. How to ask for more when I was the one to draft up the fine print and insist on the terms and conditions. I was happy for every minute we spent together. Little by little you made room for me in your life, in your space. You were already so generous, it felt selfish to make further demands. Instead, I relied on my actions to do the asking for me.

“I was practically nesting with you. The vintage couch? Yes, I’m overly enthused about Danish designers and mid century modern, but I’m not in the habit of dictating other people’s furniture purchases. Do you know what drew me to it?” Clarke shakes her. “You. You have always been compelling to me. I was imagining us on that couch. The picture was so clear in my head about what we’d look like together. I saw Sunday breakfasts and Friday night movies and mid afternoon naps. When I looked at the couch, I didn’t see leather and wood. I saw you. I saw us.

“When we woke up the next morning, with you in my arms, it scared me. It scared me how much you—the concept of an _us_ —had become a possibility in such a short amount of time. How easy it was to break my promise not to fall in love, how much harder it was to keep my feelings from growing. I know we said everything _but_. But the thing is,” she says, “you’re easy to fall for, and I’ve never been good at following rules. Particularly not my own.

“You were supposed to be my six months, fun and simple sex, but in three you had become everything that I wasn’t looking for. I didn’t want to stop,” Lexa confides. “I realised, belatedly, that the conditions I had placed on our hookups meant I basically cornered myself: I could lose you if I confessed to things changing for me because then our contract would be null. When you were checking in, I panicked thinking it meant you would be checking out if I answered incorrectly. So instead of telling you then and there about how I truly felt, unsure if you felt the same, I thought it was better to keep going, forge ahead. Keep the status quo.

“Later, when you asked outright about stopping, I didn’t know how to tell you it was the last thing I want. Or how to put any of that into words without risking things ending. I also wanted to spare you undue pressure over feelings I couldn’t control and that you may not and had no absolutely no obligation to reciprocate. My feelings were my burden to bear.” Lexa rubs a hand to the nape of her neck, cheeks pinking in embarrassment. “So, um, yeah ... long story short, I kinda really, _really_ , like you, like beyond a normal, possibly to an obscene amount, and was too afraid it was unrequited to say it.”

Lexa goes quiet afterward, letting Clarke process the deluge of new information. Her shoulders relax like a huge weight has been lifted off. But when Clarke doesn’t respond for a stretch of time, merely blinking, worry visibly seeps back into them.

“Have I scared you away by saying too much? Is this the part where you gently but firmly reject me?” Lexa quips, trying for levity, though a discernible nervousness taps at Clarke’s leg with her thrumming fingers despite the lighthearted tone. “It’s not you, it’s me?”

Clarke shakes her head.

Without a word, she gets up and heads for the door to go retrieve what she had dropped, her heart in less pieces than where she had left it.

“I did plan to return this eventually,” Clarke says upon sitting back down and hands the protective headwear over to Lexa, who looks relieved to see Clarke hadn’t actually left. Clarke adds a smile to put Lexa’s mind at further ease. Her comment is a belated riposte to Lexa’s previous remark of her thievery ways. “It’s why I dropped by.”

Noting the time, Lexa lets out a light laugh. “At this late hour? Couldn’t wait?”

Clarke shakes her head again, sheepish. Better late than never. There’s a small stab in her chest at her prior worry of being too late.

“Thank you.” Lexa’s face softens turning the hard hat over in her hands. She looks touched. Examining the custom artwork, she remarks, “This is beautiful.”

Clarke smiles at the memory of hand-painting it and labouring over the forest scenery. Her breath catches at the brightness of Lexa’s eyes when their gazes reconnect. The colour that inspired the artwork shines at Clarke with uncontained pride like she grew the pine trees herself.

“I had a whole speech planned about what green means to me, and felt like you needed to hear it before one more day slipped by, taking us closer to you leaving,” Clarke says. She gives Lexa’s knee a light knock with her own. “It’s fair to say I’ve been equally obsessed with you.”

Lexa beams at Clarke’s confirmed reciprocity. The toothless smile pulls at Clarke’s own.

“That ... that’s good to hear.” The relief on her face is palpable, previously beset with worry.

Just as Clarke is about to recite the speech she had rehearsed on the ride over and in the elevator up, Costia pokes her head in.

“Sorry for interrupting,” Costia says timid, then looks to Lexa, “my phone’s dying. Do you have a charger? My UK adapter is with my checked bag.”

“One second?” Lexa asks Clarke, looking torn to leave their conversation and waiting until her nod to rise to her feet. “I’ll be right back,” she tells her softly. The hard hat is placed to the side.

Clarke watches as Lexa guides her friend to the office den, overhearing Costia ask with gentle care, “How’s it going?” and Lexa’s partial reply, “She’s still here so that’s got to be a good sign, I think ...”

Clarke exhales, taking the opportunity to arrange her thoughts. Costia’s reappearance has her rethinking the situation with Lexa through another lens: the ‘best by’ date that’s overshadowed everything. Lexa is still going back to London.

“Sorry, where were we?” Lexa asks as soon as she rejoins Clarke on the couch, installed next to her this time.

Clarke lets out an unsure breath.

“If I’m being honest, I don’t know, Lexa. I don’t know where we are. _What_ we are. Even though everything you explained makes sense, I’m still confused. There’s been so many mixed signals and no small amount of surprises and conditions.”

The goal posts of their relationship keeps moving, constantly changing Clarke’s emotional calculus around their friends with benefits agreement. She doesn’t know how to keep up with the latest development. How many times she can rearrange her heart before it doesn’t fit back together.

“I feel like I’ve always been on the back foot with you,” she continues and rattles off, “the contract, Anya not knowing outright about us, then tonight and Costia. It’s a lot to process. More complex than I thought it would be. It hasn’t been casual or simple.”

“I know, I’m sorry.” Lexa looks genuinely contrite, then self-deprecates, hanging her head. “I have this tendency to over-complicate things.”

The innocuous comment pushes an intractable truth into sharper focus.

It _should_ be simple. Lexa admitted her feelings, the same Clarke has been harbouring. They should be able to pick right up where she wanted things to head before the fateful encounter with Costia threw everything into a tailspin. But seeing Costia, a stark reminder of Lexa’s life elsewhere—an ocean away—reality crashes back to shore.

Lexa’s salvo of admissions can’t discharge the imminence of heartbreak when the Atlantic becomes a real barrier. Nothing simple about a love that, although requited, ultimately, has nowhere to go.

Unblinded by lust, Clarke newly recognises the narrowness of her situation. The limit of options and her utter impotence in having a choice.

While a plausible explanation has been offered for every one of Lexa’s complications, and while Clarke has been a willing and oftentimes enthusiastic participant in their dance, she has not once been in control of what happens next, going along with every twist and turn. Lexa’s approaching return to England is another occasion where Clarke has no say. The lack of future agency makes every present decision moot. Months of bliss ignoring the inevitable suddenly comes to the fore and overwhelms her.

“I think I want to uncomplicate things.”

Lexa’s head snaps up.

“What does that mean?” she asks, looking scared. Eyes searching, filled with new concern.

“I don’t know,” Clarke repeats, rubbing at her own eyes with the base of her palms, needing to break from Lexa’s expectant gaze. “Costia will head back to London and then you too, and,” Clarke speaks her inner thoughts out loud but trails off on the crucial bit. _And I don’t know if my heart will survive it._

“I told you we’re not, Costia isn’t—”

“Costia isn’t the problem,” Clarke finishes, but her presence is the signal helping Clarke to finally read past the noise: she and Lexa have gone about all this backwards. “We’ve been moving so fast. Maybe we need to take a step back and take stock. Take time to figure stuff out. Maybe a reset would do us good.”

Lexa stiffens, panic resets into her shoulders. Her movements stall.

There’s an awkward silence for awhile, Lexa repaying intense attention to the floor carpet again and Clarke taking her turn at unsuccessfully capturing her gaze, until Lexa pipes up with a questioning look about Clarke’s sudden retreat. Sadness in her eyes. A slight shake in her voice. “Are you breaking up with me?”

“Were we ever really together?” Clarke wonders this quiet part out loud too, her inner anxieties getting the best of her, and immediately regrets it seeing how the words cut deep across Lexa’s face.

“I’d say, carnally, very much,” Lexa jokes, although too quiet to have much conviction. Her voice carries a false humour that Clarke doesn’t miss, nor does it escape her notice the way Lexa’s face crumbles before it quickly recovers to offer Clarke a tight smile, masking over the brief look of heartbreak.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that. Of course, we’ve been together.”

“What did you mean then?”

The question sounds small yet hopeful.

“Your deal was very specific when we started all this. It’s hard to untangle from something that was supposed to be tangle-free. Stringless,” Clarke replies.

“My deal sucked.” Lexa asserts bluntly. “I’m happy to renegotiate,” she offers with renewed purpose, sounding eager to accommodate. “If I hadn’t been clear before, I’d really like to remain tethered to you in every possible way, but will settle for whatever capacity you’ll have me. If that’s something you want?”

 _I want you_.

Clarke’s instinctual answer is quelled from being vocalised by the pragmatic reality of the time limit they have left with each other, in addition to the geography challenge.

“I want to say yes,” she decides on honesty instead. “With Costia here though, I’m reminded that even if we remain attached, that string is still 3,000 miles long. You’re leaving either way, Lexa. Does it even matter?”

“It does to me,” Lexa insists, fighting Clarke’s nihilist pessimism for the both of them. The impending long distance seemingly not a factor. “If _this_ ,” she indicates the space between them with a wave of her hand, “is what you want, we can figure it out together. You don’t have to do it alone.”

“But won’t I be once you’re in London? I can’t help but think this was only ever going to be the outcome anyway. We have our fun but then you have your life over there and I have mine here. We’re just getting to the conclusion faster by distancing ourselves now.” Clarke swallows the lump in her throat that’s re-emerged, genuinely wondering if she’s still playing a game of truth or lie. “I don’t know how to make the ocean smaller. Before it gets any harder, and while we still can, wouldn’t it be best to go back to basics? Friends again?”

Lexa appears to find sudden interest anywhere but Clarke’s face. They both become acutely aware of their handholding. Lexa lets go of Clarke and sits back on the coffee table, distancing herself, and sitting on her hands as if not knowing where to put them now that they’ve lost their purpose.

“How will it work, basic friends?”

Again, Clarke doesn’t know. They went from 0 to 60 in the blink of an eye. To reverse course wouldn’t be as easy as slamming on the breaks. They practically live together and, with the exception of tonight, haven’t spent more than an afternoon apart for the longest time. It’d be a monumental ask to wean herself off of Lexa’s affection, let alone her presence.

A self-inflicted, brutal blow.

Nevertheless, Clarke worries that if she doesn’t take the reins now, her heart wouldn’t be able to survive the permanent loss in a couple of weeks time. This way, a metered, practice run at separation, she can ration the pain in increments. She can manipulate time.

Her dad is an aerospace engineer and when Clarke was younger, he taught her about falling stars. He told her of the work of an Italian physicist, Carlo Rovelli, on the nature of time. “A star collapses and forms a black hole, and for a very long time stays there – maybe billions of years later it becomes a white hole. But imagine falling into a black hole. You would fall very rapidly through the transition [to a white hole], and very rapidly you come out. Your time is less than a millisecond.” But being only eight years old then, the concept of quantum gravity and the brevity of time was beyond her grasp. Her concern was elsewhere. “Did it hurt? When the star fell?”

She was scared of falling into black holes, of the injury sustained by such a rapid descent, but her dad reassured her that, like stars, everything that falls into a black hole is going to come out of the white hole. That the falling in, and the coming out, will happen so quickly, it will be painless. Looking now at Lexa sitting across from her, and still not understanding anything about gravitational fields beyond the swoop of her stomach when their gazes connect again, Clarke thinks her dad and the physicist are wrong. Science is wrong. How can a spent star collapsing under its own weight feel nothing?

Looking at Lexa, it doesn’t feel like nothing. Moving from friends with benefits to just friends, is Clarke’s attempt to unfall from gravity’s pull. And, hoping it won’t hurt.

“Can I kiss you?”

Lexa, it seems, has another idea about physics.

The follow-up question surprises Clarke, pulling her from her thoughts. It’s not rhetorical nor an abstract request. There’s a plea and a determination in Lexa’s eyes as they flicker between Clarke’s eyes and lips.

“It might be helpful to determine what constitutes basic friends, to set friendship boundaries,” Lexa presses, completely serious. She looks proud of her reverse logic.

Clarke laughs and softens at the obvious change in tactic. Feels gravity’s tug. Doesn’t fight it.

“And you think kissing will do that?”

Clarke is already off the couch despite the challenge in her ask. She settles onto Lexa’s lap, giving into the need to erase the last of the yawning distance that’s been between them tonight. If Lexa is thrown by Clarke’s sudden closeness, it doesn’t show. Habit and instinct overtake her surprise. They sigh at the intimate contact, both sinking into the welcomed familiarity. Lexa’s hands immediately go to her waist while Clarke’s pair find their routine place hooked by the wrist behind Lexa’s neck, forearms resting on her shoulders. Burrows into the safety of her arms.

“Yes,” Lexa answers, gaze intent on Clarke’s lips.

She shifts Clarke’s weight to distribute it more evenly across her thighs. The movement causes an accidental brushing of Clarke’s centre against her abdomen, pupils blow wider while twin gasps fall out.

Lexa looks ready to take Clarke right there on the coffee table with Costia in the next room.

“Baby, we can’t lust our way out of this.”

“Just kiss me and you’ll have your answer,” Lexa whispers, unjustly imploring with deep green eyes. Her thumbs draw comforting circles at Clarke’s hip bone.

“Misquoting Sylvia Plath I see.” Clarke is well aware she doesn’t have to kiss Lexa to know how important she is to her, per the writer about the telling value of a kiss.

“She was onto something.” The plagiarist defends. “Kiss me, and if you still want to be friends after, I will be the best friend you’ll ever have. I’d win trophies for friendship goals, not only participation medals—”

Clarke cuts off her rambling by sliding their mouths together. It’s only a brush at first, enough to shut her up. Soon, at love’s quiet insistence, the kiss deepens, lips moving with gentle, soft purpose. It’s unbearably tender. A susurrus of want.

She has many favourite things in the world, new and old. Peruvian coffee. The first crack of paint on canvas. The view from a crane tower. Rooftop secrets and the ales of Red Hook shared under the string lights of a hazy summer night in Brooklyn. None of them compares to this. To Lexa’s kisses. To the nips and tucks, the push and pull, a murmured exchange of _yes_ and _more_ in place of lost words. To the way her heart flutters when Lexa gains entry after parting the seam of her mouth and proceeds to encode messages with her tongue. Verse and prose spelt out in sighs and softness and sticky warmth. Most of all, her favourite thing, is the press of Lexa’s hand on her lower back to draw Clarke impossibly closer as if her next intake of air depends on it. As if Clarke’s nearness is reason to breathe.

“Well, that was unfair,” Clarke bemoans, though there’s no real bite to her complaint given her disappointment their kissing ends sooner than she wanted, despite it having gone on longer than her lungs can handle. “Who would say no to that?”

“Now or in three weeks, I’m not ready to let this go,” Lexa says, breathless. “But, if it’s been too much, I will absolutely respect your decision should you choose to be just my friend. We are what we are. Whatever you want us to be.”

“Can I get back to you? It’s kinda hard to make an impartial decision when I’m especially partial to how you taste.” Clarke wipes the shine off of Lexa’s plump bottom lip with her thumb. Lexa takes the opportunity to suck on it. The move does nothing to help with her indecision.

“I know it’s been a lot, and all of it on my schedule so you have every right to take your time. It takes as long as it takes. I’ll wait.” Lexa rubs up and down her back in a soothing pattern that has Clarke wanting to give her an immediate answer. “When you’re ready, I’ll be here.”

It’s confusing. Clarke doesn’t know exactly what Lexa is asking her to be ready for. She’s certainly not prepared to say, “Yes, I’m in”, one day and then goodbye at the airport the next. Clarke drops her head onto Lexa’s shoulder, needing reprieve from the earnestness of green eyes. Gentle fingers comb through her hair, massaging reassurance into the back of her head that melts Clarke into further submission and the realisation that, whatever her final choice, it will be extraordinarily hard to give this up.

“We’ve got three more weeks,” Lexa appends. “I’m happy to spend it however you like. Then go from there.”

The remnants of Clarke’s defences crumble at her sincerity. She lets go of a long-held breath.

“I need to sleep on it,” she says into Lexa’s neck, after turning her head to nestle into its crook. Succumbing to exhaustion from a conflict of head and heart that hopefully the morning will shed better light on.

“Do you want to stay over?” Lexa whispers, cradling her closer, gently rocking them together. It’s a loaded question that Clarke seriously considers accepting her counteroffer for a minute, feeling a flare of the arousal that always sits low in her belly whenever Lexa spoons out affection like it’s medicine. Considers taking the kissing further, as unwise as it is.

“What about Costia?”

“She can have this ugly couch. Or I’ll kick her out, make her go sightseeing. She’ll be up for awhile anyway,” Lexa suggests. Clarke laughs at her seriousness of forcing Costia to be a tourist in the dark. Lexa noses in and traces a pattern along the underside of Clarke’s jaw, trying to sweeten the deal. Not very platonic and completely contrary to her follow-up words. “It’s late. You can sleep with me. Just a sleepover. Friends do that.”

Regular friends do. They don’t.

“Babe, we’ve never been friends who _just_ sleep over.” They have never been just anything, Clarke recognises. She yawns into her neck, the pet name and Lexa’s reactionary shiver to the puff of air hitting her skin, makes her case. Wandering hands find their way to her ribs, strengthens it. “You’re too much of a boob girl to trust that you’ll keep your hands to yourself.”

“True.” Lexa shrugs, unbothered by the accusation or its accuracy. Yet remains hopeful. “There’s always a first?”

Clarke lifts her head up and placates with a kiss to the tip of her nose. Relents, laughing, when Lexa chases her lips for a proper one. When they pull back, Lexa’s distracted peering into the exposed vee of her shirt, a thinly veiled hunger, suggests there’s no chance she won’t be palms spread all over and fingers deep in Clarke as soon as they hit the mattress.

“No, I better go,” Clarke says, despite a reluctance to leave the warmth of her Lexa cocoon, and fights the dregs of fatigue and arousal to shift to her feet. It’s been a big, emotional night. They can both benefit from a short separation and some needed perspective. Combatting the answering pout Lexa forms, she appeases, “We’ll talk more tomorrow, and if I’m feeling generous, you can have one _friendly_ grope.”

“Okay,” Lexa eases into a sincere smile, linking their fingers to lead Clarke to the door. “Text me during your ride, I can keep you company until you get home safe.”

Clarke responds with a kiss, grateful for the care. They linger in the slow heat of a worn-in intimacy. She leaves on the promise made by Lexa’s lips, an echo of a future within grasp, and in her soft utterance that Clarke doesn’t hear after the door closes,

 _I love you_.

It only occurs to Clarke as she curls into bed later, sleeping on Lexa’s side of it, that Lexa was the one to say the words first. Clarke never said them back. Instead, she tells them into the pillow that still smells like Lexa, not knowing what else to do with them now but holding out hope they will find their place eventually.

_I love you, too._

_— VIII. The Compromise —_

“Can I have an Americano, please?” Costia turns to smile at Clarke standing next to her in the queue at Wood’s café, looking overly pleased with her selection. “I’ve always wanted to say that whilst in America.”

Clarke laughs, charmed, despite her every intention initially not to like Lexa’s ex. “I have not been to France yet, but I have a similar dream about ordering French fries.”

“Actually, that’s a massive misconception. Fries originated in Belgium, but because Americans had heard the locals speak French, they attributed it to France.”

“Ah, I see, blame Americans for the world’s confusion.”

Costia’s smile gets larger. She gestures to the blackboard with the credit card in her hand. “What would you like?” Before Clarke can object to her paying, Costia qualifies with a mischievous gleam, “It’s on Lexa! I snagged it this morning since I didn’t have time to exchange my pounds yesterday. Do you think she’ll know it’s me if an unreasonable amount of _I love NY_ paraphernalia shows up on her monthly bill later?”

Grinning, Clarke places her order, the usual coffee and croissant, thoughts going to their mutual _friend_.

“Is this your first time in the US?” She asks as they move to the side to wait for pickup.

Costia shakes her head. “I’ve been to Coney Island before on a school trip during sixth form.” At Clarke’s quirked eyebrow over the unusual international destination, Costia explains with a chuckle, “We were studying seaside settlements. The headmaster wanted to compare your Brighton Beach to ours.”

“How was it?”

“Interestingly, it started my love affair with Ferris wheels. But while wide-eyed sixteen year old me shamelessly, absolutely loved it, I get the feeling there’s more to America than corn dogs, arcades, and amusement parks.”

“Nope, I think you got the gist of it,” Clarke jokes, enjoying their friendly banter.

“This is my first time seeing Lexa’s hometown though,” Costia offers, effectively answering Clarke’s unasked question. “The timing never worked out for me to come over when she did to visit her family. She owes me a roadtrip next time I’m back for longer.” She contemplates the future scenario for a second then decides, “We’ll make it a threesome.”

Clarke’s eyes widen, both amused and horrified by the idea of being sandwiched in a top-down between Lexa and her ex for miles on end.

“Speaking of, I can’t believe the bugger ditched us.” Costia laments when they go to pick up their beverages.

“Something about the wrong cladding being delivered,” Clarke says, though she suspects that was an excuse to abandon her with Costia for forced bonding. “Some sort of stone emergency? Frankly I’m not too sure. I kinda zoned out after hearing the words _shale_ and _quarry_.”

“She is rather annoying about her stones.”

On the topic of stone, Clarke notices the rock on Costia’s ring finger, which she hadn’t registered last night.

“Congratulations by the way,” Clarke wishes as they eye an empty table that newly opened up. She tips her head to Costia’s hand after leading her to the free spot. “Gaia has great taste.”

“Oh, thank you.”

The shy smile is unexpected for how outgoing of a personality Costia has. The pink cheeks make Clarke wonder if she herself blushes as much at the bare mention of Lexa’s name. If the same glow is discernible.

Clarke listens as Costia recovers to tell her about the proposal which took place where they had originally met and how Gaia’s nervousness had more to do with the location than the momentousness of the moment. She joins in her laughter learning of Gaia’s post-acceptance confession about her fear of heights and disdain for Ferris wheels but willingness to forgo personal safety in the name of love.

“She wouldn’t look anywhere but in my eyes during the whole ride, which I thought was romantic at first until I realised it was her survival instincts kicking in.”

Their conversation is easy, it flows as much as the refills of coffee. Minutes within her company, it became apparent Costia is not a threat. Clarke can see why Lexa would be attracted to her. She’s kind and funny and has a boisterous and contagious laugh. In speech and manner lie a combination of her circle of friends’ most distinct traits. Raven’s extroversion, Octavia’s sensibility, and Lincoln’s sensitivity, paired with a blend of unique Brit dryness and Anya’s cutting humour. Were Clarke of a different persuasion (or if her sight was not set firmly elsewhere), Costia would be the kind of girl she’d let pick her up at a gallery opening and talk to her all night long about bathroom tiles and herringbone patterns.

The notion should be jarring but waking up this morning, feeling lighter than the night before, it’s not so disorienting to be having thoughts about her _not_ -girlfriend’s ex-girlfriend.

“So, you and Lexa?”

Costia fixes her an appraising gaze, the question deliberately leading.

Clarke doesn’t flinch from her scrutiny but does take a large swill of her hot drink. Lets the burn distract from the spike in her heart rate.

“Yeah,” is all she acknowledges, not knowing what more is to be said at this point with a decision and a deadline hanging in the air.

Costia narrows her eyes, studying Clarke’s poor feign at nonchalance. At her persistent non-commentary, Costia takes matters into her own hands.

“You know how she really, really loves avocado?”

Clarke nods slowly, curious as to where this is heading.

“And given the opportunity, talks about it as if she witnessed Sappho birthing the fruit on her island.”

Clarke laughs at the imagery. The visual striking.

“That’s ... pretty accurate, actually.”

“Well, I’ve only ever heard her speak with such excitement one other instance.”

Clarke raises her eyebrow, intrigued. What else would capture Lexa’s attention to the same magnitude or single mindedness?

“Months ago, after settling in at work, she called me about this trespasser onto her site.”

 _Oh_.

Clarke unconsciously leans forward in her seat, curiosity more than piqued.

“I couldn’t get a word in before I realised the grumpy lion she’d been blathering on about was a girl with ‘really yellow hair’ and ‘really blue eyes’.”

Costia’s impersonation is surprisingly spot on, down to the lilt of Lexa’s voice.

Clarke tucks blonde hair behind her ear seeing Costia’s gaze fall to the errant strands.

“I doubt anything can compete with avocado,” Clarke demurs of her equivalent affection to the fruit.

“I’d bet my return ticket home, Arsenal platinum membership, and the entire cost of my wedding, that you would win by a fairly wide margin.”

Her mind goes to Lexa’s voice in her ear keeping her company on the ride home and to the missed voicemail she had finally listened to afterward. Lexa’s message about her airport run was equally soft and sleepy—and seeping with adoration that bled through the phone’s speaker. After some rambling, she had signed off on a commitment to let go of words she couldn’t hold in anymore.

_There’s something I have to tell you.  
Something I need to say first._

Maybe there is more than a kernel of truth to what Costia is saying.

“Look, Clarke. I’m only here for a few days and soon to be stuck in a convention hall with cologne-enthusiastic blokes trying to sell me curtains and magic carpets, so I’ll cut to the chase. Lexa is head over heels for you.” Costia reaches out and squeezes her forearm. “Give her a chance.”

Costia and Lexa must have had a chat after Clarke left.

Reading her mind, Costia appends, ”Lexa told me this morning. Practically had to force it out of her. With the timezone difference, I don’t have the mental acuity to handle that pout. She hadn’t slept much last night.”

It occurs to Clarke then that the early morning text she had awaken to, a simple heart emoji, was likely a late night thought. It took strenuous self restraint for Clarke not to follow up with her own. Love declaration by emoticon isn’t how she imagines finally telling Lexa.

“Lexa and no sleep is peak brooding ground,” Clarke comments. She can’t help picturing the shape of her lips in its puckered fullness and has a tremendous urge to run into her meeting and interrupt it simply to kiss the pout off.

“For purely selfish reasons, if you could do the kindness of putting her out of her misery so I don’t have to deal with transatlantic sulking later, that’d be lovely.”

Clarke laughs again. “I will take your mental wellbeing into consideration.”

The transatlantic part is what gives Clarke pause each time she thinks to abandon caution and dive right back into Lexa’s arms. Her hesitation must read plainly.

“For further consideration, I’m happy to also provide a reference letter vouching for her stellarness as girlfriend material,” Costia offers. A disarming sincerity to be helpful.

“I’ll keep that in mind, but I’m okay for now, thanks. I have it on good authority from a reliable primary source that she would be,” Clarke answers, smiling thinking of all the ways that Lexa shows up for her. But then she has to ask, a question that’s been at the back of her mind since they entered the shop. “This is not weird for you?”

Clarke doesn’t only mean sharing coffees with your paramour’s former paramour. While the ring on Costia’s finger should indicate enough how much Costia has moved on from Lexa, it’s such a novelty to Clarke, unable to imagine how she could do the same in her position. Struggling as is at the prospect of cutting ties.

Costia catches her drift, the question behind the question.

“Am I gutted that Lexa ended up with a gorgeous babe who’s a talented artist? My pride might be the tiniest wounded my art skills tap out at finger painting,” Costia admits, giving her a playful smile to her bashful one at the indirect compliment. Then shakes her head. “But no, I made peace awhile now that Lexa and I work better as friends.”

Costia pauses to take a sip of her drink. Clarke does the same, giving her time to gather her thoughts.

“The intimacy and understanding between us, while a blessing and rare to find with anyone, only extend so far as friendship. Don’t get me wrong, Lexa is fit, annoyingly and stupidly attractive. In spite of that, our physical chemistry wasn’t what it should be. What I’d imagined yours is.” Costia hedges. Clarke’s blush is answer enough. Satisfied, she continues. “Our romantic, or even cosmic, stars, never quite aligned, even if everything else fell in our favour. It was a hard pill to swallow at first and took longer than it should have for both of us to reach that conclusion, but it’s for the best.” The ring of truth to Costia’s reply echoes something similar Lexa has hinted at the night before. “Out of misguided loyalty, we were holding onto each other and consequently one another back from exploring alternative futures and meeting the one meant for us. Lexa’s fealty is bar none. It’s simply been with the wrong person. Until she met you.”

Clarke wishes she shares Costia’s surety but hearing the conviction in her voice does quiet the louder doubts plaguing her.

“I’ve never been an ardent subscriber to the idea of ‘the one’,” Costia adds, “believing instead we do have more of a say in what happens to us, that it takes hard work and not merely the sprinkling of fairy dust for two people to be together. Truly, after meeting Gaia and now seeing Lexa with you, I’ve been inclined to revisit my beliefs. Maybe it’s not such a rubbish myth.“

“I think it’s a combination,” Clarke inputs. “Half fate and half fight.”

“Right. Lexa is someone I was willing to put in the work—and vice versa—but where it counts beyond the platonic, ultimately, we’re not the ones for one another.”

The question is left hanging whether Clarke believes Lexa is the one—platonic and romantic and cosmic—and if she is who Clarke is willing and wanting to work hard for. Serendipitously, with prescient timing her phone dings with a text notification. The tug in her chest at seeing Lexa’s name across the screen provides a telling answer.

“Her ears must be burning,” Clarke says, gesturing to her mobile, and relays the message. “She’s going to be longer than expected and may have to skip lunch altogether.”

When Clarke excuses herself for a moment to order Lexa’s favourite sandwich at the counter for later takeaway, she avoids the perceptive look from across the table on her return. Costia knows the answer too.

With sudden fascination for sodium, Clarke fiddles with the salt and pepper shakers on the table for a drawn out minute, making inconsequential observation about their unique design. Thankfully, Costia accepts the diversion for what it is and picks up their chatter again.

The conversation moves on from there to swap stories about how she and Lexa met, Costia then filling in some of the gaps in their history left by Lexa’s non-disclosures and Clarke’s prior reticence to hear anything about her. Their friendship has Clarke smiling widely by the end and feeling a measure of peace about the shape of this triangle between the three of them and her place in it. A stable tripod compared to the wobbly peg she assumed herself to be.

“Anyway,” Costia rises to her feet after finishing her last anecdote and extends a hand out for Clarke to join her. “Since our mutual _friend_ will be tied up for awhile, it falls to you to show me John McClean’s New York. Lexa thinks I’m here for work and to see her, but really, Die Hard is my favourite action film series. My other American dream is to visit all the cities he’s destroyed while yelling yippee ki yay.”

“It’s a good thing I’m in love with Lexa, or Gaia might have to worry about me asking you out,” Clarke says, shaking her head entertained by Costia’s groundedness, but doesn’t realise what she had let slip out until Costia is staring at her pleased and knowing.

Even by accident, it feels good to say the words out loud.

Nonetheless, Clarke sidesteps the giant elephant she just unveiled standing behind transparent curtains, and downs the last of her coffee. Deftly leapfrogs Costia’s followup comment.

“It’s a good thing we’re both happily taken.”

With Peruvian-fuelled clarity of the decision she’s inching towards making, Clarke leads Costia out of the café.

—

Clarke is nervous.

Lexa looks more so, shifting on her feet waiting for Clarke to let her into her apartment.

They haven’t seen each other since that night meeting Costia. With Lexa taking over tour guide duties and with their schedules conflicting outside of work hours, texts and phone calls have been the sustaining contact between them.

“Hi,” Lexa greets and gives an endearing wave at the doorway. Clarke can’t help but match her smile.

She looks soft and disheveled in an oversized hoodie and mismatched socks as though she had rushed to come here. Rocking on her heels, hands are in her back pockets ostensibly trying to keep them to themselves.

“Hi.”

“I’ve missed you.”

“It’s only been two days.”

“Two days too many.”

Clarke refuses to melt but does return the sentiment.

“I missed you too.”

“So ...” Lexa prompts.

“So,” Clarke replies, purposefully not taking the hint.

After her afternoon with Costia, Clarke knew what she wanted with Lexa, a topic that’s been tiptoed around during their late night catchups but which now hangs expectant in the air.

Seeing the infectious hope in Lexa’s gaze she wants to spill her decision then and there. But Clarke has a plan. A new deal in which Lexa may not be on board.

So she stalls.

She leaves the door open and walks back to her couch to resettle into the cocoon set up for what was thought to be a movie night for one, not expecting to see Lexa because of Costia’s final night in town. Then Lexa had called to say Costia caught an earlier flight to Chicago to avoid the incoming storm, and asked if she could come over.

The ‘yes’ fell from Clarke’s mouth at the same time her stomach began to flip. It hasn’t stopped since.

Blanket pulled back by the corner, Clarke silently invites Lexa into the warmth.

“Nice cocoon.”

“Thanks. Made it myself.”

“I see that. I would grant you a building permit.”

It’s a fair bit lopsided and not as neatly pitched nor well layered as Lexa normally has it but Clarke is proud of its structural integrity anyway.

“You better dust off your resume, I’m coming for your job.”

“Should I be worried?”

“Mm-hmm.” Clarke says absently, trying to adjust one blanket to cover Lexa’s long legs, only to give up and tuck them under hers to compensate for the lost coverage. The simple way Lexa bends and folds in, pliant under her touch without question, affects Clarke more than it should. She rethinks the career pivot a second later, persuaded instead by her newfound love for cranes. “Changed my mind, you can keep the ground. I’ll take over the sky.”

“Anything you want.”

“Anything I want?”

“Yeah,” Lexa says softly, looking like she would hand the world to Clarke by the craneful if asked. “What else do you want?”

Her eyes flicker to Clarke’s mouth, a look of intense concentration which sends another flutter in her stomach. Clarke tracks the movement of her lips too, stares at how they lightly part.

The nerves return. Anticipation builds. Clarke is a hummingbird’s heartbeat away from giving in. Eyes locked into Lexa’s bottom lip.

“I want ...”

She answers without looking up. Can feel a hand near her thigh, practically vibrating not to reach out.

“Yeah?”

Clarke turns to the TV, clicks play, “... to Die Hard with a Vengeance.”

Lexa, credit to her, takes the delay tactic for what it is and snuggles in for 128 minutes of violent retribution.

Clarke wonders how many action packed scenes she will be able to withstand without lodging a complaint. A closeted romcom fan, which Clarke has only recently discovered, it must be a fair bit of torture for Lexa watching the lead go on a rampage instead of a romantic adventure.

“I knew I shouldn’t have left you with Costia,” Lexa eventually sulks when John McClane is onto diffusing a third bomb.

“She’s lovely,” Clarke chides, coming to the defence of her new friend. She has to bite the inside of her cheek when she glances over and sees the crinkle of Lexa’s nose up in disagreement. Takes pity and offers an olive branch. “We have the same taste in movies and girls.”

Previously slumped in her seat, Lexa perks up. Her spine springing back into place. It’s the most alert she’s been since before the opening credits rolled.

“What type of ... movies?”

Clarke has to stifle a laugh at Lexa’s last minute swerve. She turns to her and fixes a look. Says with meaning. “A mix of predictable and unpredictable,” she pauses to watch the onscreen explosion before adding with emphasis, “and very hot.”

Her eyes re-find their North Star on Lexa’s lips, distracted by the tongue that peeks out to lick them of their apparent sudden dryness.

“So?” Lexa pushes. “Just friends?”

She stares at Clarke, trying to read for clues of a decision. After a long pause, Clarke bites her lip and slowly shakes her head.

The corners of Lexa’s lips pull up. Muted joy seeps into their curve.

She looks cautiously happy, eyes roaming over Clarke’s face trying to interpret the tea leaves of Clarke’s nonverbal answer. Cautiously optimistic of the possibility Clarke has not friend-zoned her.

The confirmation comes in the form of Clarke reaching up to brush her thumb across Lexa’s bottom lip. A gentle swipe. Unable to stand any longer not touching. She has wanted to run her hands all over ever since Lexa appeared at her door.

Lexa returns the gesture. She traces something on Clarke’s cheek. It turns out to be a smudge of paint when her fingers withdraw to reveal cobalt blue on their tips. Clarke isn’t afforded time to be embarrassed about how long the pigment has been there nor to consider how much Lexa must have resisted wiping it clean all this time in respect of boundaries.

Their mouths come together in lieu of a next breath or a next thought. Heart beating fast, Clarke moans, having missed the press of Lexa’s lips and the wanting weight of her tongue when Lexa licks inside. Lexa’s hands cup her face, a cradled tenderness as they find the right angle. The gentle pressure sets her heart racing.

Friends don’t kiss like this. Full and devouring and every gradation of soft and deep.

Lexa pulls at her, heavy with intention. Reading the signal loud and clear, Clarke climbs onto her lap with the help of eager arms carrying her momentum. The movie is immediately forgotten as they make up for 48 hours of absent contact. Lost in the reacquainting.

Clarke grinds against her one minute. In the next, her top is chucked somewhere over the couch and out of mind. Lexa’s mouth covers one breast sucking on her nipple until hardened while she palms the other with equally urgent need. Clarke arches her back, pushing herself further into the heat of the moment.

She is throbbing below and can’t get enough friction. Her whine is cut off by Lexa’s return to kissing, swallowing each whimper with singular drive matched to the movement of Clarke’s hips.

Just when the burn between her legs begins to feel unbearable, fingers are on her, stroking and circling. Her breaths shorten considerably.

“Clarke, you’re so wet.”

The words don’t take hold until Lexa dips inside and pumps, fingers sliding easily in and out. When they curl and hit the right spot, Clarke keens and finally registers what’s happening and seconds away from occurring. What wasn’t part of the plan.

“Lexa, wait. Wait,” Clarke pants, wrapping a reluctant hand around Lexa’s wrist to slow her thrusts and putting the other to her shoulder to create some needed distance.

Lexa immediately backs off, though her fingers remain inside. Clarke’s walls pulse and try to draw her in further. Clarke drops her head on her shoulder, breathing through her arousal and resisting every impulse to ride Lexa to kingdom come.

“We should talk,” she suggests, voice feeble, the air in her lungs still faint.

“Sorry, you’re kinda,” Lexa apologises, scrambling for words and ends on, indicating Clarke’s general person, “ _you_.”

Clarke’s last shred of control is thrown out the window at the earnestness of green fighting intense arousal. She kisses her with drunken affection for guilty-looking, rose-swollen lips. Changing her mind, she sinks down on Lexa’s fingers once more and starts a new rise and fall motion. On her verbal consent, “I’m sure”, to Lexa’s checkin, Lexa picks up speed again, and one swell swoop later, has Clarke on her back on the couch. Pants are removed, legs spread wide and knees pushed back to her chest as she rocks into her with unfettered purpose.

For the next while, they are a collaborative effort between _yes_ and _more_ and _fuck_ and _harder_.

A tangle of limbs.

An entanglement of cries.

“Baby, please, I’m so close,” Clarke is begging as Lexa swipes at her clit in too-gentle passes.

She doesn’t expect Lexa to withdraw completely nor for her to leave the couch and room entirely. But when Lexa re-emerges shortly thereafter from Clarke’s bedroom, harnessed in their favourite toy, Clarke has zero complaints for the change in agenda. Clarke’s throat is dry where elsewhere it is anything but. Lexa renters her within seconds of another nod of consent. She clings on, wrapped in Lexa’s scent and Lexa’s want and Lexa’s driving lust.

“Friendship is overrated,” Lexa gasps as she sinks in deeper. Clarke would laugh if she didn’t wholly agree. Instead, her heels dig into Lexa’s ass, pushing her on.

Her orgasm arrives hard and fast, taking Lexa with her with how vocally it’s expressed.

The second and third and fourth rounds, because one is never enough, are slower, less hurried races to release. After stumbling toward the bedroom unwilling to separate from kissing, Lexa lays her on the bed and makes gentle love over and over. The toe curling kind. The full body shudder, breath stealing kind. The makes Clarke believe in fate and universes colliding, kind.

All their pent up emotion find its way to the surface, skimming along heated skin and warm mouths and at the tips of searching hands. From on top and behind and below, bent over the bed or cradled between her legs, Lexa unravels Clarke. An unfolding of exquisite grace, at the height of pleasure but also the perch of love.

Lexa slides into Clarke, the strap foregone this last time in favour of fingers again and the intimacy of direct contact. Her breathing is as ragged as Clarke’s. Heartbeat as thundering too by the heaving of her chest. Tears form in Lexa’s eyes. Bottom lip trembling at the surge of affection she seems unable to contain.

Clarke kisses it steady and whispers three words that quiet its shake.

“I love you.”

The tears well over and Clarke kisses them too. Gathering up the wetness and spreading warmth in their wake.

“I’m in love with you, too,” she continues to say, repeating it as Lexa folds into her. “I love you so much.”

Fingers go the deepest they can. Hips the slowest that clamouring heartbeats will allow. Their bodies join as one in mutual expansion and contraction.

A union unlike others. Sunken in full knowledge of a tethering reciprocity. Where one leads, the other follows. Hands and mouths find their echo with each stroke and kiss and stretch of name.

“Oh _god_.”

One wave of pleasure crests into another. She is riding Lexa’s face on the next go and somehow still being fingered at the same time. The headboard creaks under her death grip.

Then a sudden wet heat envelops her clit and Lexa is sucking and sucking, and sucking some more. Mouth sealed around the bundle, tongue lapping against its swell. Hand palming her behind.

“Fuck, _fuck_ , I’m coming.”

Lexa locks eyes with her for a brief moment. Gaze intense. With Clarke’s attention captured, she eases off. Then, with puckered lips, she presses the faintest whisper of a kiss to the tip of her clit.

Sets match to kerosene.

Clarke cries out her final orgasm with Lexa’s name held silent and sacred in the roof of her mouth. Eyes slam shut in pure bliss.

When she opens them again, long minutes after her come down, Clarke finds Lexa staring up at her, the softest look yet.

“Hi again.”

“Hi.”

Lexa’s returned greeting is accompanied by a wiggle of fingers. Clarke moans. On a closer look she sees that Lexa is still knuckle deep inside of her.

“Comfortable?”

“It’s nice and warm.” Lexa grins. A wide thing. “Might just move in here forever.”

“Oh, really?”

“Yup.” She wipes at her chin, an intentional slow-show. “The Thames has nothing on you.”

Clarke groans, lowers herself then buries her head in the crook of her shoulder, laughing. “Lex, that was terrible.”

“Apologies, I’m not thinking straight. My puns are watered-down.”

“Ugh,” Clarke laughs, pushing at her shoulder. “Why do I love you again?”

“I’m not sure either but am glad you do.”

“Against my better judgment, I unfortunately do. Like beyond a normal, possibly to an obscene, amount,” she parrots.

Lexa hums happiness. Clarke presses into her side.

“What were you saying earlier?” Lexa asks softly, eyes lidded and unfocused.

It takes Clarke a good second to remember what her words were before things got carried away. But the pleasant soreness between her legs is a throbbing reminder.

“Right, new deal,” Clarke says, with enough wherewithal after the momentary fog clears.

“I like the way you negotiate.”

Hazy in the afterglow, Clarke doesn’t have her usual arsenal to volley back Lexa’s quip.

“Earlier, you asked me what I want?”

“Is it safe to assume I’m part of the equation?”

Lexa’s question-as-answer is followed by trailing fingers that find the underside of her breasts, skating back and forth. She bends her head down to kiss each in turn, paying slow attention to the forming bruises and soothing them with a warm tongue. Routine to her aftercare, the kitten licks are not sexual but the affecting tenderness threatens to steer things in that direction again.

Clarke shakes off the persistent arousal to say, “Actually, you’re all of it.”

“How so?”

She takes a deep breath.

“I want everything with you.”

Lexa’s face turns up brilliant, until Clarke finishes the sentence.

“Everything but sex.”

Seeing as they are presently naked together, four (maybe five) orgasms later, Clarke’s revised proposal faces insurmountable odds of being adopted.

Lexa for her part looks affronted, like someone just slapped the smile off her face and called their unborn children ugly.

“Not where I thought you were going with this.”

Clarke tries not to laugh.

“Lex, don’t give me that look.”

“But ... but,” Lexa protests, words dropping off, lips preparing to make a familiar shape. Clarke cuts off the pout with a chaste kiss.

“You’re gorgeous and hot, with a body that makes me forget my own name because I’m too busy wanting to call out yours every waking moment. Exhibit A.”

She gestures between their bodies.

Lexa blushes while simultaneously lifts her chest in pride. “That doesn’t sound like a problem.”

“That’s been our _exact_ problem. Too much sex.”

Lexa, weirdly, raises her hand, and waits for Clarke to call on her before lowering it.

“Um, hi, yes, I disagree. Strongly.”

Clarke laughs again, pushes at her shoulder again. This time Lexa catches it before she can retreat, wrapping it with her own. Clarke’s heart tries not to trip over itself as Lexa mindlessly curls their fingers into a familiar fit, thumb tracing over her knuckles, that has Clarke second-guessing her deal before the new terms are even inked.

“We have incredible sex.” Lexa hums agreement. Clarke resists kissing her again to continue, “And you’re incredibly distracting. But as I’ve come to realise, intimacy with you does things to my judgment.”

“Easy solution, stop being so judgmental.”

“Lexa,” Clarke warns, though there’s no bite to it.

Lexa surrenders with little resistance. “Okay, okay. Tell me about this new deal. How does the arrangement work?”

“The way I see it, detachment is obviously not an option at this point. Let’s embrace the short time we have left. Three weeks to be together, to give us a real try. We date. I make you breakfast, you get me coffee. We make each other laugh. We finish the Die Hard series.”

“Costia will be happy.”

“Did you know the first film was based on a novel called Nothing Lasts Forever?”

“That’s not reassuring, Clarke.”

Sidestepping the cynicism, she pushes on, expands, “Taken together, the message of the book and movie title is, live like it’s your last days.”

“That’s certainly one way to spin it.”

“Instead of Die Hard, think of these next twenty one days as Love Hard.”

“But we can also Sex Hard too.” The pout returns, full force.

“If we keep sex in the equation, it’s all we’re going to do,” Clarke reasons, ignoring Lexa’s sad look that makes her want to cave. “I don’t know what’s going to happen on the 22nd day when there’s a giant body of water between us but I’d like to spend the three weeks leading up to it madly in love without the cloud of intense lust. Your deal was everything but love, mine is everything but sex. Explore the love part. If this month is what I get to have with you as a couple, I want it to count, to make new memories outside of our apartment walls.

“I want to do disgusting things that disgusting people in love do. Like go to the movies and only order one popcorn and fight over giving each other the last kernel.

“I want to go see a Mets game and pretend like I know what sport it is we’re watching. I want to look hideous in orange and blue but for you to fawn over me anyway and tell me how much it brings out my eyes while we gorge on overpriced hot dogs and you try to explain for the umpteenth time how to know who is winning.

“I want rooftop dinners where you try to cook and I pretend you succeeded but will later in the night, when you’re not looking, brush my teeth and tongue vigorously. I want to fall asleep under the stars wrapped in your arms and that tattered wool blanket with the raccoons on it that were secretly your childhood best friends.

“I want to sneak onto other construction sites and climb atop other crane towers to get a different view of the city and to have your narration in my ear about what we’re looking at—to see the lights through your eyes. Then wake up the next morning where the only view worth taking in is your bed head and the fight your curls had with overnight humidity.

“I want to spend every day with you as if it’s our last together. But we can’t do that if sex is still on the table because then all I’d want to do every waking minute is to be under you, for you to fuck me well and good, to have you inside me, to hear you call out my name and I beg to come. To taste you and suck you afterward and know that you were just as desperate.

“As appealing as a hide away with you in a sex cave is, I also want to explore all the ways in which you are soft and tender.

“I want to feel that softness and that tenderness deep in my bones. Carved into my heart. Seeped in my veins.

“I want to chase after and collect every possible happiness out there with you. Condense them into the time that remains to know that I’ve gathered enough moments to beat back the inevitable force of sadness for when you are no longer with me.”

Within the briefness of time, Clarke wants to discover the fullness of life with Lexa.

When she finishes, Lexa stares for the longest while. Then she asks, brow adorably furrowed,

“So, basically, LWB?”

“Huh?”

“Love without booty.”

Clarke lets out a hearty laugh, releasing the breath held during her speech.

“That’s certainly one way to spin it,” Clarke mirrors, chuckling.

“You know, it’s kind of cruel.” Lexa rolls over on top of her. “You get a girl naked in bed with your feminine wiles and then tell her sex is off the table.”

Clarke laughs, bright and warm.

Lexa laces their hands, pins them above Clarke’s head against the mattress. The move presses their chests closer together. Clarke has to fight an impulse to rescind her deal. Just let Lexa have her way with her.

“What about holding hands?” Lexa squeezes them. Her inquiry into the terms a good sign of her receptiveness.

“Of course.”

“And if my hands wander?”

It’s precisely what her left one does in show, stroking up the side of her ribs to the swell of her breast, stopping short of her nipple. Clarke’s breath hitches.

“Anything above the belt, north of the waist, is fair game.”

Lexa massages her breast in gratitude, a-washed with relief that her favourite body part of Clarke’s is located in the approved hemisphere. Clarke considers moving the meridian line up well past her neck when her nipple hardens under Lexa’s care. This time, there’s no question about the explicit nature of her intent. On a roll and tug, Clarke fails to cut off the whimper that’s been threatening to come out. She’s come from breast play alone before and it wouldn’t take much to put this decisively in the sex column.

“But in the event I get my north and south mixed up because your hotness disorients me?”

Catching Lexa off guard, Clarke manages to flip their positions, landing on top.

“You stay on the surface, no penetration.”

“Ok, good, good.”

Clarke has to laugh at Lexa’s self-consoling. Is thankful that Lexa’s hand doesn’t travel wayward to prove this particular point.

“Bro, it’s not a hard boundary. I’m not deluded to think we can go from _this_ to 100% abstinence. If things get heated, which inevitably they will, we just go with the flow but stay mindful to stop before it becomes me bent over the couch and you fucking me three fingers deep into next Sunday.”

The image alone has Clarke swallowing hard. Lexa appears to be faring no better, her fingers dig into Clarke’s skin where they grip (respectfully) at her waist.

“Did you just call me bro?”

“Yes?”

“So, can bros kiss?”

“God, yes. Absolutely.”

Permission granted, Lexa darts upward to kiss her. Clarke bends down meeting her halfway. The questions continue after, replaying like the negotiations the first time around.

“Spooning?”

“Of course.”

“Showers?”

“That’s pushing it,” Clarke grins, pokes her in the side while knowing already she’s not willing to give up heated makeouts under streaming water. “How about on a case by case basis?”

Lexa nods. “That’s amenable.” She kisses Clarke on the cheek. “Does that cover all our bases? Anything else?”

“One more. You like lists. I made a list.” Clarke reaches over into her side drawer to pull out the crinkled piece of paper she has been drafting and revising since her chat with Costia. It itemises every typical relationship milestone and cliché. “We’re going to cross every item off.”

Lexa scans it with a degree of skepticism as though Clarke had received her PhD in romance psychology from the University of Google.

She sets it aside. Reaches up to cup Clarke’s face. Clarke melts into the touch. Allows herself to be handled until they are both sitting upright in the middle of the bed, Clarke straddling her with legs bent at the knee around the small of her lower back.

“Okay.”

“Okay?”

“Yes, okay. I’m in.” Lexa proceeds to manipulate Clarke’s hands into various positions like they are finalising a business merger with a secret handshake conceived on a schoolyard. “You’ve got yourself a new deal.”

They kiss for an undefinable stretch of time after, inking the new contract. Hands in hair. Chest to chest.

“I’m going to stay on the surface,” Lexa gives soft notice when they come up for air, then reaches to press play on a song list from her phone. Music envelops the room. Lexa whispers, reassuring, “Promise.”

Next thing Clarke knows, one of Lexa’s legs is lifted to cross over hers. Scissored as such, Clarke whimpers when she feels their wetness meeting and Lexa starts a slow grinding motion synchronised to the wafting melody.

Lexa pauses for consent to keep going. A helpless _yes_ tumbles from Clarke’s mouth onto the brow of kiss-bruised lips. She wraps her arms around Lexa’s shoulders. Deepens the kiss. Lets Lexa guide her by the hips into a sway, gently rocking them to and fro.

Silent words of love are exchanged, traded back and forth by the slips of tongues and the swells of sighs. As they slide together, lower lips petaled, aching and searching, Clarke doesn’t think she’s ever been this wet. With the night’s activities, it risks being an overstatement if not for the pooling want marking her inner thighs and leaking onto the bed.

Despite being empty of Lexa’s fingers or of silicone length, Clarke feels indescribably full. It’s a surface only stimulation yet it’s as though she’s been penetrated to her core.

She makes the mistake of glancing down and finds their clits red and swollen, rubbing together. The visual knocks the breath from her lungs.

“Lexa,” Clarke gasps.

Her name drops from Clarke’s lips like rain from the sky, a soft patter against the windows, asking to be let in.

“I know, bro, I know.” Lexa coos, rubbing harder but somehow at once softer. The new nickname escapes Clarke’s notice. “Me too.”

A thumb soon joins below, strategically placed between them for mutual use.

“ _Oh god_.”

Clarke drops back onto her elbows, which consequently lifts her ass higher and further into Lexa’s lap. The heels of Lexa’s feet planted by her sides sink deeper into the mattress, giving her leverage to grind with unhurried abandon. Hips dragging with slow and devastating precision. Clarke rides the new position and Lexa’s thumb equally lost to the rhythm set by the next ballad’s bluesy notes and Otis Redding’s soulful crooning.

Every fibre of Clarke’s skin empathises with the burning and yearning he sings about. In Lexa’s arms and by her tender lips, Clarke understands the wanting of a scratched-in, worn love.

The world narrows to the space between them, to the series of moans bracketing their connection and making elisions of heartbeats.

“You feel amazing, Clarke.”

Their orgasms hit at once as the chorus of a new song ekes out of the phone speaker.

 _I’ve always been a dreamer,  
_ _I’ve had my head among the clouds.  
_ _But now that I’m coming down,  
_ _Won’t you be my solid ground?_

Clarke’s earlier fears of gravity and of falling stars find temporary reprieve in the solidness of Lexa’s ground.

In the steadiness of her hold.

In the sway of love’s quiet season.

“What was that?” Clarke breathes heavy into the base of her neck, smile wide against sweat-soaked skin when she comes back down.

Lexa lifts her head to direct her gaze out the window. The storm outside has come and gone without notice, the clouds have parted. A luminous crescent hangs from the sky.

“We can cross _slow dance under moonlight_ off the list.” Her lips quirk up. “And also, _seduction by musical persuasion_. Two birds, one stone.” She pulls Clarke in closer and jogs her hips. “Two bros. Hard love.”

Clarke stares at her, equally exasperated and equally overwhelmed by affection. The ridiculous smug look. The bloom of pink exertion across pronounced cheekbones. The slope of jawline titled upward in lopsided smile. It’s a given. Love without sex will be impossible, Lexa’s loose interpretation of sex will make it all the more difficult.

But if this version of ‘everything but’ is what she gets to have for the briefness of 21 days, it is a compromise Clarke is willing to make.

_— IX. The Catch —_

Things go to plan about as well as she should have known.

It becomes apparent very quickly how much of a massive miscalculation Clarke has made. The glaring flaw in her plan’s logic: herself.

True to her word, Lexa commits to the new deal with faithful adherence. They go on dates. They cross items off the list one by one. They sleep (platonically) together. She respects the agreed-upon physical boundaries, never so much as puts a hand under Clarke’s skirt or shirt. Doesn’t even cop a feel.

It is driving Clarke nuts.

The first week is pure torture.

Clarke is the one who struggles to keep up with her end of the bargain.

She hadn’t anticipated that a romance-focused, sex-evading Lexa would be exponentially more attractive.

In many ways, things aren’t much different from a benefits-focused, sex-craving Lexa. Merely ten folds of what Clarke had fallen for in the first place.

Movie marathons and blanket forts and rooftop dinners are thoughtfully planned and carefully executed. Her chicken tastes like rejected rubber but everything else Lexa does is tended to with soft consideration for Clarke’s comfort and maximum enjoyment.

There are more candles and flowers than a firefighter or florist would approve of. Her neighbours are beginning to think her apartment has become a tulip rescue sanctuary.

There are notes left behind around the apartment in odd places when Lexa is out or at work. A “go kick ass” sticky in her shoe on a day Clarke has a big meeting with an important collector. An “I thought you might like this song” note is taped to the inside of her headphones on afternoons Lexa knows she needs to be productive for her upcoming show. “I like this one” notes proliferate her sketchbook, so many it’s hard to tell what Lexa _doesn’t_ like. Always, though, signed with, “comma, love.”

There are walks in the park. Ambling along the docks. Visits to galleries. Overflowing grocery carts and fruit aisle fights. Takeout menus stained in lagers and laughter.

There’s kissing. So much kissing. The kind to burrow into. To idle time away and lose uncounted minutes in pressing softness.

Lexa’s tongue finds secondary home in her mouth when she’s not sucking black and blue into her neck and along the top of her breasts, setting off butterflies in Clarke’s stomach on an hourly basis.

But the one significant difference is that all the glances and touches and kisses go nowhere. Lexa always retreats, apology on the tip of her tongue. Clarke’s arousal is left to dry in the heated space Lexa leaves behind hurrying to the bathroom, where she forgets that the acoustics in there reverberate, subjecting Clarke to moaning sounds that provide no relief.

Thrice now, Clarke has awoken from wet dreams that have no outlet outside of cold showers (alone) and excessive self care.

Lexa, frustratingly, is the perfect gentlewoman.

While absence does make a heart grow fonder, it also certainly makes her libido grow more impatient.

By the second week, Clarke has had enough. The first breach of contract happens on a seasonally milder December Sunday that Lexa decides is a ripe time to teach Clarke how to catch a ball.

Several feet away from the picnic at their usual spot, Lexa has set her up with a glove. Despite fervent protests that it’s really not a necessary life skill for Clarke to know how to intercept a flying projectile, it was hard to deny Lexa of her excitement at finding two old pairs of gloves in her dad’s garage. One just happens to be (conveniently) left-handed.

“It’s meant to be, Clarke,” is the flimsiest excuse Clarke has ever accepted in the name of love.

It’s been 45 minutes and Clarke has not caught a single throw from Lexa. The ball never quite makes it inside her glove. Mostly, it bounces awkwardly near her or off the back, tip and side of the mitt. No amount of adjustment to her hand position, body angle and stance, nor to Lexa’s distance, pitch and force, changes the outcome.

One compelling reason for the misses, which Clarke will not admit out loud, might be attributed to Lexa deciding to show up at the park in the tights of her old highschool uniform. The way they hug her ass, Clarke doesn’t understand how that is not cheating—unsportsmanlike conduct—which would put the opposing side at an unfair advantage. It’s beyond distracting.

The other reason might be that each time Clarke misses, Lexa takes personal responsibility to correct her movements, invading her space with her scent and soft instructions. No matter Clarke’s intended focus, concentration flags under the pressure of fingers pushing this way and that.

Lexa kicks her feet wider. “There, stand with your feet farther apart, not too close together. And don’t forget to bend at the knees like we talked about last time. Makes for better balance.”

Clarke would disagree. With Lexa’s hand gently cupping the back of one knee while the other hand had accidentally slipped to her backside when she bent over, things feel fairly unbalanced.

“Lexa,” Clarke whines. “Why are you punishing me? Is this your revenge for no sex? I will happily let you take me behind that tree right now if we could stop with this fantasy of yours that I have untapped hand-eye coordination in me.”

Lexa laughs. “C’mon, you have to at least catch one. Just one, bro. It’s not that hard.”

Clarke huffs. Part of her irritation is that Lexa has taken to deliberately replacing ‘babe’ with ‘bro’. It’s spoken with the same affection but is no doubt done on purpose to needle her.

She scowls catching Lexa’s under breath comment as Lexa jogs back to her spot, “I can’t believe this is so hard.”

Watches her eye the location of Clarke’s glove, calculating the aim and required trajectory. Brow furrowed, adamant in her quest for Clarke to experience the winning thrill of ball catching.

Clarke sighs when she sees her arm wind back and then release the ball in an underhand lob.

She closes her eyes, sticks her glove up randomly in the air in the open position and prays to an unknown god to please let this be over soon.

Some kindhearted deity must have heard her plea because she feels impact against her palm, a minor sting, and then hears a whoop sound coming from Lexa. When Clarke opens her eyes again, miraculously, there is a ball sitting in the web of her glove.

Split seconds later, Lexa rushes forward and is spinning her round in an airlifted bear hug with unadulterated joy, the loudness of cheer and the scale of celebration disproportionate to the feat.

“OMG, you did it!”

Between fits of giggles, Clarke demands Lexa put her down. When she finally does, the air immediately changes between them. The adrenaline still coursing through Clarke means that her chest is heaving, making rubbing contact with Lexa’s.

Gazes flicker between eyes and lips.

Clarke can’t stand it anymore.

She drags Lexa to that tree. Thankfully, it’s large enough and located off the main path some ways that they are hidden from general view. In seconds, Clarke is pressed up against her and kissing Lexa like it’s an Olympic sport.

Lexa moans and grips her tighter. As the kissing intensifies, her hands lower subconsciously to knead into Clarke’s ass, pulling her closer. A muscled thigh is then slotted between her legs.

It happens embarrassingly fast. Clarke grinds down. Three, four sharp hip jerks later and she’s bucking into Lexa, biting into her neck to dampen the volume of her orgasm. Her cry of pleasure is further muffled by Lexa’s mouth catching her in a deep kiss. All tongue and no grace.

“Fuck, bro,” Lexa exhales after. It’s followed by a lace of amusement in her voice. “I’m starting to really like this new arrangement.”

“Shut up, that doesn’t count,” Clarke murmurs, laughter tinged with embarrassment.

It definitely counts.

She abruptly walks away, back to their picnic area but far away from the glove and ball.

Lexa shouts from where she’s still recovering slumped at the tree. “That’s what winning feels like!”

—

The second, below the waist, breach catches Clarke by surprise.

Their next physical encounter is a different kind of intimacy, crossing into a new threshold of taking care.

The day after their baseball outing, Clarke worries she may have crossed a line that she herself drew. Lexa has been staying with Clarke everyday so when she doesn’t come back to her place the following Monday after work, after not having heard from her all day, fear creeps in.

Calls go unanswered.

Texts stay unread.

Complete radio silence.

Clarke is ready to storm to Lexa’s apartment to demand answers. Doesn’t want to be caught out like the Costia situation. Not again.

At the exact moment she yanks her door open to leave, Lexa is standing there. Arm mid raise, hand formed in a fist ready to knock.

She’s still in her work clothes but they’re crumpled. Her nose is red, eyes fairly sunken. Posture uncharacteristically slouched. Lexa looks miserable and also like she just woke up.

“Clarke,” Lexa croaks out, voice thick and stuffy. A smile and a look of relief washes over seeing Clarke.

The feeling is mutual.

But then Lexa’s body slackens, falling forward as if intending to offer a hug. Luckily, the distance between them is not great. Clarke bears her weight with some effort but is happy to share the load.

Momentary happiness turns to deeper worry when she feels the heat emanating from Lexa who, shivering, tries to nuzzle in for warmth into the curve of Clarke’s neck. Her forehead is hot to the touch.

“Lexa, honey, you’re burning up.”

Lexa has the flu.

“Sick.”

“Why didn’t you call?”

“Fell ’sweep desk. Phone forgot. Battewy.”

A limp finger points to the side table by the door. Lexa’s mobile sits innocuously in the keys basket where it hadn’t occurred to Clarke to look before.

Of the truncated responses, Clarke is able to piece together a working narrative. Lexa fell asleep at her office, likely exhausted, an early flu symptom. Apparently had forgotten her phone at Clarke’s place. The battery died.

Lexa is huffing from the exertion it must have taken to put two words together in addition to making her way here.

“Miss you,” is spoken into Clarke’s neck, followed by a bout of coughing.

Clarke bundles her inside headed toward the bedroom but Lexa resists, contradicting her earlier self to insist she’s not sick, so Clarke instals her on the couch instead. Leaves her for a second to grab her favourites of Clarke’s sweats.

“Tired.” Watery, puppy dog eyes greet her as she kneels in front.

“I know.” Clarke sweeps a loose strand away from her face. Threads fingers through her hair and lightly massages her scalp. Lexa melts into the touch. “You can sleep soon. Let’s get you into something comfortable first.”

“’K.”

Lexa agrees but makes no move to be useful. Clarke does 98% of the work of removing her coat then suit while Lexa leans heavily against her and gets in the way.

It is as endearing as it is annoying.

“Arms up, bro,” Clarke teases.

Her latest prompt goes unheeded like all the others and Clarke has to manoeuvre lead-weight noodle arms into the sleeves of her alma Mater sweater. The joggers are only slightly easier, aided by Lexa’s willingness to at least lift her bum on command.

By micro negotiations later, Clarke feels as put out as Lexa looks. Sweating nearly as much too. At Lexa’s shiver again, Clarke gathers a pile of blankets from the linen closet and proceeds to layer them on her to set up a makeshift cocoon.

“No, I do it.” Lexa oddly picks this moment to assert her independence, snatching the wool from Clarke’s hand with alarming speed relative to her energy level, looking the most alert yet. Her voice is strained but Clarke can make out, “You’re no good with forts.”

She doesn’t take offence and leaves Lexa to it, along with a glass of water and whatever unexpired medication she could find in her cabinet, in favour of darting down to the bodega for a quick supply run.

When Clarke returns, it looks like Lexa has lost her fight with the blanket fort. Her cheeks are rosy warm from what appears to have been a valiant struggle. She gives it a miserable tug, too weak to have any effect.

She looks pitiful, but also really cute.

Less cute, the medicine is untouched. Although the water is half gone at least.

Putting her purchase bag down, Clarke reaches out to help right the top blanket but Lexa snatches it away possessively.

“Mine. ’S cold.”

“I’m not going to take it from you.”

Lexa hugs it tighter in disbelief.

“Lexa, let go of the blanket so I can get you warm.”

“Makes no sense.”

“It does to the non-congested half of the population in this room.”

Lexa peeks her head up, looks around as if conducting a census count. Looks downcast to discover she represents the other 50% and sniffles her disappointment to not have a winning majority.

“Leave me.” Lexa martyrs, then in the next breath, rasps. “I’m dying, save me. I’m in distress, Clarke.”

“You are the biggest baby and so goddamn dramatic.” Clarke laughs.

“No, Clarke. I warrior.” If she had the energy, Clarke imagines Lexa would thump her chest in emphasis. As is, her hand barely lifts before falling flatly back down.

But the movement is opportunity enough for Clarke to manage to steal the blanket back from Lexa’s death grip. Rearranges it to drape around herself, and by some extensive nudging, gets Lexa tucked into her front, Clarke sitting behind her.

Lexa burrowed against her chest.

“S’nice.”

It is nice.

“What’s really nice is if you could take this,” Clarke uncaps the medicine bottle.

Lexa turns her head, preemptively refusing. Buries it in Clarke’s neck to avoid any possibility.

Her skin is worryingly hot. The fever spiking. Clarke lays a gentle kiss to her damp hair. Lexa purrs at the comfort.

At Clarke’s further attempts, she stares with disdain at the caplets and emits a low-energy but distinct and stubborn, “Nooo.”

“I know, gross, right?”

Despite having a doctor for a mom, Clarke has her own legendary aversion to medicine. She may have met her match in Lexa. Gains new sympathy for the difficulty her parents must have faced with little sick Clarke.

Out of ideas, she resorts to Plan B.

She and Anya have graduated to a semi-texting relationship so Clarke reaches out to Lexa’s sister for advice on how to help Lexa help herself, not understanding why swallowing two pills is such a battle.

The answering text is just as mysterious but at least it provides Clarke with a direction.

_No pills. Liquid._

Fortunately, she had the foresight to buy additional medicine on her run, which came in a syrup version.

Anya’s follow up text makes her smile, she mentally notes to get the full backstory from her later.

_Bribery also works on crybabies._

“Baby, c’mon, you’ll feel better,” she coaxes. Lexa stops her head shaking to deliberate the pros and cons, appearing more receptive to the liquid Clarke has poured into the bottle’s cap. More receptive to the more familiar nickname. Clarke sweetens the deal, teasing. “How about you put on your big girl pants and then we can nap together?”

“Sex?” Lexa brightens in counteroffer, eyes filled with misplaced hope.

“Maybe,” Clarke lies, stifling a laugh.

That dangled carrot works and Clarke is able to ply her with the appropriate dose and the rest of the water.

“Best girlfriend ever.”

The title falls as precipitously as Lexa’s eyelids closing, having given up the fight to fatigue. The first out loud confirmation of who they are to each other. It sends a thrill through Clarke, stomach swooping.

As Lexa snores softly shortly after, Clarke spooning her from behind, she mentally rearranges tomorrow’s schedule to clear her day so that she can tend to her sick _girlfriend_.

Later that night, on the heels of a bowl of homemade soup successfully spoon fed with less resistance than the medicine, the title earns its keep as Clarke bathes Lexa.

Naked together in the tub, there’s nothing sexual about the way Clarke pays attention to the aches and sores of Lexa’s body, moving the sponge in gentle passes. Although everything is above board, it’s the most intimate they have ever been. The macro of love in micro actions.

Sat between her open legs, Lexa’s head is leaned back against Clarke’s shoulder. The water is too warm for Clarke but she endures it for how Lexa sinks into her touch, skin supple and pruned.

Whether it’s the fever working its way or the medicine-delirium speaking, Lexa is looser with her often held-in words. And possibly not aware of who her audience is.

“I’m love sick,” she whispers, like it’s a confession. “She’s a real catch.”

“Tell me about her,” Clarke fishes.

“She sucks,” Lexa declares and Clarke almost regrets asking until she finishes the sentence a long beat later, “at catching baseballs.” Her nose scrunches in thought. “Don’t tell her but, she’s very awful at it.”

“Our secret,” Clarke promises, smiling. She’s nearly done having scrubbed every inch possible of Lexa’s body but slows the last bits out of self interest in order to hear how this plays out.

“It’s her only fault. Everything else is perfect for me.” Lexa summarises. “She’s so pretty. And draws pretty pictures. And makes pretty noises when we fuck. The prettiest.”

Clarke is glad she’s sitting behind Lexa where her blush is out of view.

“She sounds great.”

“You would like her.”

“You think?”

“Uh-huh. But you can’t have her because I called dips.”

“Don’t worry, she’s all yours,” Clarke muses. Kisses the top of her shoulder to reassure.

Lexa nods, appeased, “Good,” and sounds relieved to have one less competitor. The ensuing silence turns thoughtful. “Do you think she would like like London?”

The question comes out small and is asked with an undercurrent of vulnerability.

Clarke freezes. Her heart stops at the implication. When it restarts, it’s rapid and thunderous in her ears.

Lexa is motionless too, shoulders tensed, breath held in. The water stills in sympathetic anticipation.

“I think,” Clarke answers carefully, tempering expectations and her racing pulse, “she would be open to switching to tea from coffee.”

“They have coffee there too!” Lexa happily reports. Joy cuts through her mucus-thick voice. “I know the place to take her.”

“She’d like that,” Clarke replies wistful.

Lexa turns her head and offers a toothless smile. The angle gives Clarke a close up view of the scar on Lexa’s lower lip. She thumbs at the shallow cut, a gentle stroke, and wonders how imperfection can make someone even more beautiful.

“How did you get this?”

Clarke doesn’t expect an answer given previous evasions to the question but tries her luck with Lexa’s current state. She’s rewarded.

“Camping. Anya’s fault.” The story comes in truncated pieces. “Called me baby for bringing my stuffed raccoon. Had to prove to her love is not weakness.” A long pause to catch her breath. “So I tried to push a mountain. The mountain won.”

Clarke laughs. Affectionately presses her thumb to soothe the ghosted pain of what must have been a rather disappointing loss.

“Aw, poor baby.”

But it would seem Lexa’s thoughts are still a step behind. Her face turns serious, brows furrowing in concentration.

“I would move mountains for her,” Lexa informs, sounding and looking determined. “Push the continents together. Make the ocean smaller. Clarke says she can’t but I can.”

Clarke melts. Bends her head down to kiss the perfectly imperfect mouth. Lexa denies the attempt.

“I’m taken.” She turns her head firmly, leaving Clarke brushing awkwardly against her ear and feeling both mildly rejected and completely endeared by Lexa’s nobility.

It’s an odd accomplishment to be kiss-blocked by herself.

“She’s a lucky girl,” Clarke concedes.

“I’m going to ask her to move to—”

Clarke abruptly gets up, effectively cutting off the sentence. Water splashes over the tub. She feels guilty for having gotten this much of Lexa’s private thoughts already. It’s gone past harmless curiosity into invasive territory. Their future is a conversation, if there is to be one, that should happen in full knowledge and not under medicated influence.

Lexa peers up confused. Her face softens when Clarke reaches a hand out.

“Alright, love, all done.”

Clarke helps her out of the tub and receives a surprising but welcomed long hug for her efforts. They’ve been pressed naked together plenty but this feels different. It feels like an inflection point, though toward what, Clarke isn’t sure yet. The embrace is intimate, so bare in its sincerity it makes Clarke ache. Her heart skips several beats. When Lexa pulls back, in a moment of clarity recognising the identity of her nurse, she smiles crooked.

Her eyes are dimmed by fatigue but the twinkle in them normally reserved for Clarke still shines bright as if they have set upon the sunrise she’s been waiting all day to see. Lexa sighs in soft relief.

“There you are.”

Clarke smiles. “I’m here.”

The world could be crumbling under their feet right now and she wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.

“I love you.”

It’s dropped so casually, like the words have been said a thousand times over already instead of it being only the third instance of their utterance, Clarke finds herself falling deeper.

“I love you, too.”

Lexa leans forward with intent, hands labouring to find their way up her neck though her focused gaze makes the destination clear.

Clarke gives into her needy pawing and gets a proper kiss this time. Lexa’s aim isn’t true, only managing to catch the corner of her mouth. Clarke helps correct her course.

The kiss is brief and relatively chaste but Clarke feels it shoot the length of her spine nonetheless with how Lexa sighs into the wet warmth as if the softness of Clarke’s tongue is a homecoming. Lexa sags against her afterward, energy expended. It takes upper body strength Clarke doesn’t have to hold her up.

“Let’s get you changed,” she whispers and receives a half-lucid, droopy nod.

Towelled dry, bed beckons them both and it only takes a small urging before Lexa is fast asleep in Clarke’s arms.

To mark this rare occasion—the second one today—where Lexa is the front spoon, Clarke takes a selfie. Designates it as a favourite in her album and then joins Lexa in closing her eyes, succumbing to a happy kind of exhaustion.

The next day is spent in pyjamas, alternating between naps and movies. Clarke spends the time in between sketching her charge, administering food and fluids, and trying not to think about what Lexa let slipped last night.

By the second morning, Lexa’s fever has fully broken and her colour has returned. With it, a bloom of pink.

“Was I a nightmare?”

She slides her phone across the breakfast bar where a text from Anya glows with sisterly menace. Groans with her face buried in one hand.

_How much you willing to pay me to stay quiet about broody Lexa’s origin story?_

After reading the thinly veiled blackmail, Clarke chuckles and puts her fork and magazine down. Pushing her pancakes to the side, she pats Lexa’s free hand on the table to grab her attention, squeezes.

“You’re okay. Doctor patient confidentiality.”

Lexa whines dramatically, unimpressed by her non-answer. She peeks through the fingers that cover her eyes, to sheepishly ask, “Did I say anything embarrassing?”

“It’s fair to say,” Clarke drawls, enjoying the blush spreading across her cheeks, “you’re lucky I already got the flu shot this year but know that, next time, you are in for a world of payback.”

Lexa smiles at the forewarning. Her shoulders pull back at the implicit challenge. Brings Clarke’s hand up to her lips, kisses her knuckles.

“Looking forward to it.”

It sounds like a future promise.

—

“How are you this strong?”

“I’m really not.” Lexa laughs, shifting her weight to bare more of Clarke’s. “How are you this heavy? You’re like three inches shorter than me.”

“Height and width have no correlation.”

“Alcohol and getting stoned might,” Lexa mutters and tightens her hold around Clarke’s waist.

The third time Clarke gets wet outside the bounds of her deal happens after a night out drinking with Raven and Anya, Clarke unable to hold her weed and liquor as much as she thought.

A competitive best friend, bottom shelf tequila, and an expired stash of pot from the college kids the next table over at the open mike, lead to her undoing.

“What about Al Capone?”

“Nothing.”

For some reason Lexa looks amused.

“C’mon, we’re a block away from the subway. Let’s go home.”

Clarke smiles goofy at the word.

“Nooo, let’s sit here.”

They’ve been trundling along for what feels like ages. Her feet are tired. She decides the brownstone stoop in front of them is as good a place as any to take a nap, the cloud of snow on it calling out to her as the perfect pillow.

“Clarke, no, it’s wet.”

There’s some jostling and protests that ends up with Clarke triumphant sitting on Lexa’s lap and Lexa looking less than amused.

Clarke snuggles in closer, head buried into the crook of her neck and arms happily wrapped around her shoulders. The night is chilly and her warmth inviting. She feels a glassy kind of content.

“Are you my girlfriend?”

“If you want me to be.”

Clarke studies her in consideration. Flecks of snow are scattered in her hair and make a white awning of her long eyelashes. Her nose and cheeks are tipped rosy from the cool evening air. Her eyes a saturated green under the attention of the moon and Clarke’s gaze.

“You’re pretty,” she concludes and gives an emphatic nod.

“Then yes.”

“Can we have sex now?”

Lexa laughs. She squeezes Clarke’s side. “Not right at this moment.”

“But you’re pretty.”

Clarke doesn’t understand why her infallible logic isn’t making a dent in her girlfriend’s resolve.

“So are you.” Lexa adjusts Clarke’s beanie and sweeps a rogue strand of hair behind her ear. “Incredibly pretty. Stunning.”

“Settled then. We can be lovers.”

“Maybe later.”

“Okay.”

Lexa kisses the top of her head.

“I miss your strap,” Clarke declares, feeling sudden sadness. “And your fingers.”

Another couple, an elderly pair of women walking hand in hand, pass them by on the sidewalk. They smile at Clarke and Lexa, but oddly especially Lexa. One of them gives her a wink. Clarke fights a flare of jealousy.

Lexa noisily clears her throat. It must have gotten colder in the last minute because her cheeks have gotten a lot redder.

“They miss you too.”

Those same fingers tug Clarke closer.

“I’m going to miss you,” Clarke adds, overtaken by a sense of despondency. Her head is somewhat foggy tonight, imprecise, but her heart is sharp with the acute pangs of an immense melancholy.

Maybe it is colder. It would explain why tears are forming in her eyes.

“Oh, Clarke.” Lexa wipes them away and kisses the dampness from her cheeks. “I know, me too.”

“You’re cold too?”

Lexa chuckles, seeming to find humour in Clarke’s confusion.

“Freezing, actually, and the wrong kind of wet.”

She shifts in her seat and winces in discomfort, but still takes care not to jostle Clarke in her hold.

“Why are you sitting in snow?” Clarke asks, perplexed. Lexa glares at her.

Her features soften when Clarke smooths fingers across her forehead. The lines relax and her eyes flutter close for a second. When they reopen the sight catches Clarke’s breath in her chest.

“Lexa?”

Lexa’s eyes drop to her lips.

“Yeah?”

“In a fight, who do you think would win? Me or Costia?”

Lexa bursts out laughing. She tempers her amusement when Clarke scowls, a demand to be taken seriously. “I don’t know, love. You’re pretty fiesty. But she’s got longer legs.”

“They are really long. Like yours.” Clarke concurs. A thought occurs to her then. “If you two pro-create, your children would have long legs too.”

Lexa’s lips tilt upwards, looking to be fighting another laugh.

“You would have made a very beautiful, long-legged family,” Clarke comments a beat later. “She’s gorgeous.”

“She is.”

Not to be outdone, Clarke asserts in a bid of confidence. “I am too. I’ve been told stunning.”

Lexa acknowledges agreement with a wide smile, not contained this time for some reason. “Yes.” She adjusts Clarke’s beanie again, which keeps falling lopsided, then places a kiss each over her eyelids, making them flutter in turn.

“You’re not ugly either,” Clarke tells her on re-opening her eyes.

“Thanks?”

“You’re welcome.”

Lexa looks absolutely smitten by her politeness. It morphs into endeared offence.

“I’m not sure how I feel about being downgraded from pretty to not ugly in the span of five minutes.”

“Hmmm,” Clarke leans forward to study her features closely, gets distracted by the flecks of green and grey, and reaches a conclusion. “We’d make pretty babies too.” A light bulb goes off then. “Let’s try now.”

Before Lexa can respond, Clarke closes the small gap between their lips, compelled by the curve of Lexa’s mouth formed in an inviting O-shape. Lexa tastes like the single craft beer she’d nursed all night in slow sips, mixed in with the semi-sweet flavour of Clarke’s cheap tequila shots consumed in too-short intervals. There’s a hint of earthiness that she chases after, her tongue lapping hungrily to find the source.

Clarke gets carried away in her task to the point that she’s turned herself in Lexa’s lap, straddling instead of sitting astride as they make out. Lost in the headiness, she starts grinding down. Lexa’s whimpered response spurs her on, mindless of their very public display.

The puffiness of Clarke’s coat makes it difficult for her movements to gain traction—and also causes a squeaky noise—but Clarke is not one to back down from a challenge.

Driven by agave-soaked lust, she pushes Lexa’s hand down inside her pants. Practically collapses forward when fingers slip through her wetness and a palm brushes against her clit.

“Clarke, we can’t. You’re drunk,” Lexa gasps against her mouth, breathing laboured. Her fingers twitch and accidentally rub against a particularly needy spot. Clarke keens into it. Lexa lets out a heavy, breathy exhale.

“’Mnot.” She pushes her hips down while connecting her lips to Lexa’s neck to prove her intact control of her body. Offers a correction. “Horny not drunk.” Then remembers the rules and instructs while grinding, “Stay on surface. No inside. I consent.” She rallies. “All good. Go!”

Clarke’s lower body takes off on her own prompt. Or tries to. Lexa is chuckling, the sound caught between laughter and lust, as her free hand holds Clarke back by the hip. Damn her strength.

“Baby, drunk consent is not consent,” Lexa softly notes.

Intellectually, Clarke would agree. Sober, definitely. But inebriated Clarke who is emotionally compromised by being stupidly in love, who hasn’t had sex in two weeks and can’t see past her alcohol-addled libido, is painfully, _achingly_ close, only one swipe away from euphoria.

“Lex, please.” The force of her plea lands Lexa fully back against the concrete steps, releasing a powder of snow with her impact. Something of Clarke’s desperation must puncture Lexa’s resolve because the hand on her hip imperceptibly loosens. Clarke takes the small opening and sinks into her palm. Lexa seems resigned and maybe equally emotionally compromised—or equally incapable of self restraint—because two tentative, experimental strokes later Clarke is nearly crying. “Yes, _oh god_ , right there, I’m gonna—”

The rest of her prediction is cut off by the loud sound of a door slamming opening. It breaks Clarke from her stupor, severing her pleasure mid moan, seconds from coming. She looks up to see an angry Anya and her nemesis, a giddy Raven, staring down at them from the top of the steps. The former standing with arms crossed and face hardened, passionately indifferent to Clarke’s plight, the latter, hand over her mouth, chest shaking in mirth.

“Would you two mind fucking elsewhere, preferably as far away from my property and field of vision as geographically possible?”

Clarke forgot they went to Anya’s afterward for a nightcap to top off their double date. She guesses they didn’t get far after leaving.

Lexa eases her hand out of her pants and protectively shields Clarke from her sister’s sight line and wrath, cradles her closer. Twisting upward, Lexa glares at Anya. The heat of it could melt the snow around them. After a silent standoff between the siblings, she sets Clarke on her feet and tucks her into her side while tapping on her phone with her other hand.

A ride-share shows up within minutes. Without another word, Lexa bundles them into the car and they speed off toward Brooklyn. The sound of Raven’s laughter ringing in Clarke’s ears.

“I’m sorry,” Clarke mumbles into her collarbone, body curled into Lexa’s side, head resting against her chest. The veil of alcohol lifts enough momentarily for her to feel a measure of embarrassment and a larger degree of vulnerable.

“Hey, you’re okay,” Lexa coos, voice warm with affection and far more patience and understanding than Clarke expects. She rubs Clarke’s back and kisses her hairline. “I walked in on them the other day so we’re even now. Serves Anya right.”

“You weren’t the one dry humping her sister on her doorstep trying to get pregnant, how is it even?” Clarke groans, thinking of her attempt to mount Lexa, not seeing the equity.

“It wasn’t exactly dry,” Lexa teases before answering properly. “She can’t step into her house now without thinking of her little sister and her hot girlfriend debasing her stoop. It re-tips the scale since I can no longer eat in Dad’s kitchen without wanting to stab my eyes out with a fork.”

Warmth spreads through her chest at Lexa’s casual drop of ‘girlfriend.’

“Was that when you bought all that bleach?” Clarke giggles, feeling safe again.

“Yes. I had to scrub his countertop. Unfortunately, no amount of ammonia can unsear Raven’s ass on marble from my brain.” Lexa shudders, shaking Clarke in turn as she starts to drift off. “Remind me never to let them house sit our family home again. Or any home. Gah, my childhood is ruined.”

Lexa throws her head back against the seat in exaggerated fashion. Clarke pats her chest in comfort, smiling at her attempt to make Clarke feel better, and falls asleep to the even rhythm of the heartbeat under her hand and ear.

They arrive in front of Clarke’s building without further incident. Lexa walks ahead and is about to guide them through the main doors when Clarke notices the patch of wetness on Lexa’s coat at her behind. It sobers her up, the most she’s been tonight since Raven’s wheedling at the speakeasy. She pulls Lexa back by the hand and gets a curious eyebrow lift.

“Thank you.”

“For what?” Lexa asks, smiling patient.

“For tonight. For this month. For all these months.”

Lexa steps back in front of her. Hands find their place on the small of her back. She mirrors Clarke’s pensive gaze.

“This isn’t goodbye, right?”

Clarke shakes her head, even if she can’t shake the lump forming in her throat. Lexa bends down to kiss her cheek. Presses in a lingering warmth.

“Good. It’s not over yet, Clarke,” she whispers into the shell of her ear. “We still have time.”

Clarke gives her a rueful smile.

“Still. Thank you, anyway.”

“You’re welcome,” Lexa says, smile reaching to her eyes. Cocks her head toward the building. “Let’s get warm and dry.”

As soon as the yes is out of Clarke’s mouth, a yelp escapes too because Lexa picks her up over her shoulder without warning. Clarke is laughing-protesting as she’s fireman carried through the lobby. Lexa huffing in effort.

“Seriously, Clarke, what did you eat for dinner?”

—

Later that night, nearer to morning, Clarke wakes up to a dampness she doesn’t expect. Small whimpering noises and the shifting of the bed had pierced through her consciousness.

It takes a moment to orient herself. There’s an arm around her middle and the other looped under her neck, hand cupping a breast under her shirt that’s ridden halfway up her torso. Warm puffs of air hits her neck. Heat against her back.

She smiles at the familiar cuddle position. Her breath hitches however when she registers the situation of her lower half and the movement behind her. Naked from the bottom down, a leg is wedged firmly between her thighs, applying pressure at once to her centre and on her ass.

Clarke is lying half on her side and half face forward down on the bed. The weight pinning her in place gently rocks in motion.

The hand massages her breast, palm rubbing against her nipple.

A long, low moan follows the movement.

Lexa is dreaming and grinding against her.

Clarke’s overnight tequila cloud dissipates and she’s suddenly incredibly thirsty. Wetness pools below and Clarke fights the urge to relieve it.

She weighs her options, whether to wake Lexa up or to wait it out. The decision is made for her minutes later when a pattern of moans has her trembling uncontrolled and pressing down on the hardened thigh involuntarily seeking friction.

“Clarke?” Lexa asks, coming to. When awareness dawns on what she’s been doing, she nearly jackknifes out of bed.

“Hey, it’s okay.” Clarke reassures, squeezing her forearm, preventing her from going far.

“I’m so sorry.” Lexa sounds mortified.

“You’re okay,” Clarke reiterates.

“Drunk Clarke fought me on pants,” Lexa says by way of explanation. “I didn’t wear any either out of solidarity.”

She moves to reach for the two pair of sweats that Clarke now sees hanging haphazard by the foot of the bed, evidence of the battle hours ago.

“No, leave them off.” Clarke swallows. Feeling the sticky heat between her legs and the wetness of her bum, she adds, “I don’t mind. I liked it,” and suggests, voice thick with arousal, “You can finish.”

Lexa stiffens, her leg incidentally jerks in excitement, the accidental pressure pulling shared groans from them.

“You sure?”

The question is edged with guarded hope.

Clarke takes off her top and reaches behind her to push Lexa closer again. Her answer comes out breathy. “Yeah. Very.”

“I ... I’ll stay on the outside.”

A rustling sound indicates Lexa is removing her sleep tee as well. It’s confirmed when Clarke feels hardened nipples pressed against her back.

“Is this okay?”

Clarke hums and wiggles deeper into the seat of Lexa’s lap. She turns and presses her face further into the pillow while lifting her bum higher, then urges, “You can use me,” and can hear Lexa’s breaths coming short.

Lexa does just that, but in the softest, gentlest way. Clarke pliant under her as she chases her release, a slow build, a quiet burn of weeks-long yearning. She knows that much of Lexa’s pleasure derives from giving Clarke pleasure, in sacrificing her need to meet Clarke’s. If she can give her this, let her be selfish for once, Clarke is happy to be used, to be lost to Lexa’s idle rutting and her wayward hands as they pay languid attention to the heavy swells of her breasts.

Normally the quieter of them, the room fills with Lexa’s soft noises. Her grunts. Her laboured sighs. Clarke bites her tongue in favour of having these rare sounds flood her ear.

Lexa spreads Clarke’s legs wider and drapes herself more fully over the length of her body. Her movements range from a slow circling of hips to long, tight drags of her cunt up and over and back down the curve of Clarke’s ass.

Clarke’s clit rubs deliciously against the bed sheet, not enough friction to be of true consequence but enough to sate her body’s usual demand to be taken, able to keep the focus on Lexa.

Lexa, on the other hand, can’t seem to help her priority.

“Touch yourself for me,” Lexa whispers next to her ear. Clarke whimpers at the need in her voice. “Please.”

At the further encouragement of a kiss to her temple, Clarke pushes a hand down and brushes through her wetness. Nearly bolts upward from the charge the minor touch sends though her body. She strokes again, starting an even rhythm, fingers careful to avoid her aching clit.

There’s no doubt they are having sex—the sweet, dawn hour kind where need and desire are wrapped in morning’s blanket—but Clarke will stick to the illusion the surface contact doesn’t constitute as breaking her own rule. She reasons it’s for Lexa’s benefit, a small reward for exercising so much restraint.

Lexa, again, is a step ahead of her.

“I can’t go inside but you can,” Lexa says, offering a solution to skirt around Clarke’s rule.

She snakes her hand around to lay it on top of Clarke’s and directs her fingers to her entrance. Gently pushes them in past the tips, while hers stop short of the opening.

It’s a shallow fill but with Lexa as director, breath warm and body heavy on her, it feels deeper than anything.

“Fuck, Lexa.”

“Imagine they’re mine,” Lexa instructs. “Imagine it’s me penetrating you. Show me how deep I can go.”

Clarke complies, hands moving eagerly back and forth, fingers in and out under Lexa’s guidance.

The intimate coordination finds resonance in how wet Lexa becomes as they move together.

It goes on like that for the next while as daylight breaks. Lexa getting off on her ass and on instructing Clarke to fuck herself. Clarke can feel the hardness of Lexa’s clit and the way her lower lips are petalled as she paints Clarke’s rear in liquid want.

“Clarke, I’m gonna ...” Lexa sounds desperate.

“You’re okay,” Clarke coos once more. Her own orgasm is so near but she holds it off for Lexa’s sake. “You can come.”

Accustomed to waiting on Clarke, Lexa lets out a whine of relief at the permission to go first.

“You can be rougher, baby,” Clarke says. “I want you to come hard on me. _For_ me.”

It’s like a light switch is flipped.

In the next instance, Clarke finds her lower half propped up with her upper half dug into the mattress, Lexa’s hand clasping around her neck pushing her face down and the other hand tightly gripping her middle.

Lexa rides her to devastating completion. Hips jackhammering at an outpace to Clarke’s continuing pumping of her fingers.

“That’s it, love, I’ve got you,” Clarke soothes. The low rasp of her voice must have an effect on Lexa because her rhythm falters the slightest.

The momentary lapse gives her an upside down view of their hands continued collaboration below and the glistening state of their inner thighs. She can’t help the mewling cry that falls out.

On that ragged signal Lexa gathers speed again, wild and uninhibited until it pitches toward complete stillness.

Her release is loud and beautiful and it precipitates Clarke’s. Lexa collapses on top of her and then catches Clarke in an existential kiss as though her mouth alone is the only landfall worth making.

“That’s one way to wake up,” Lexa summarises while catching her breath. She rolls them over so that Clarke is lying on top, head against her chest. Chuckling, she asks needlessly, “Does that count as sex?”

“That definitely counts, _bro_ ,” Clarke confirms, light laughter blossoming with the flush of her cheeks.

“I won’t tell if you won’t.”

Clarke brushes damp hair away from her face. Tips forward to hold her bottom lip in between hers, sealing the promise in.

“Our secret.”

Lexa’s gaze turns soft and sleepy then.

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

They laugh at the parroted conversation. The outburst of joy ebbs into drowsy affection as Clarke rearranges their bodies and limbs to take up the same cuddle position.

“Your deal is way better than mine. Booty levels better.”

She falls back to sleep with the widest, stupidest smile.

_— X. Coda to Love —_

The rest of December passes in a flurry. In the blink of an eye, the days have dwindled until the inevitable arrives.

All the deal-making and the rearranging and the putting off have come to this.

In the movies, airport goodbyes often work out for the protagonist. The orchestral music swells. The milling crowds part. Heartfelt if not cliché declarations are made. The lovers reunite. It’s a predictable cinematic sequence with predictable outcomes. Fortunately or unfortunately, Clarke’s romantic gesture doesn’t end as happily, and not even at a terminal or concourse. Somehow their parting is at once worse and way better than she could have imagined.

It happens in the darkness of Lexa’s corridor. Another 1:00 am confession, on the rare occasion that Lexa is back at her own apartment following her farewell dinner with coworkers.

What Lexa had let slipped while sick hasn’t come up. Maybe she’s working up the courage or has changed her mind, nonetheless, the subject has not been broached since the bathtub. As the hour hand turns and the minutes tick down, Clarke needs resolution more than she needs sleep.

Before Clarke can knock on Lexa’s door, however, it swings abruptly open. Lexa looks sleepy and gorgeous, coat half on in mid rush to get out.

“Clarke?” Lexa asks, brows furrowed in evident surprise to find her in the archway and a fist raised. A soft smile blooms on her face. “We’ve got to stop meeting like this.”

“Please don’t go.”

“I was about to head over to yours. You didn’t have to make the trip,” Lexa informs, rubbing the sleep from her eyes and letting out a large yawn, “I don’t mind going,” not catching Clarke’s import, confirming instead her prior plan to come back to Brooklyn. “Sorry, I fell asleep, the carb load got the better of me,” she admits, patting her stomach. “Emori from accounting also made us try her husband’s moonshine. It was awful but effective.”

Clarke pulls her into a desperate, pressing kiss. She tastes like holiday wine and candy cane sweet.

“Missed me?” Lexa flirts afterward, looking contently dazed and missing out on Clarke’s urgency. Unaware of the future scenario running rampant through Clarke’s mind.

The one that hit like a freight train hours earlier and had tightened her chest into a vise while waiting for Lexa’s return. She had found a familiar article of clothing inside her pillowcase while folding her laundry. The thread-bare Columbia tee somehow still smelled of Lexa despite having been mixed in with her wash. Realisation dawned that the scent lingers because Clarke had changed her detergent months ago when they started unknowingly cohabitating, making the brand switch after Lexa had made a convincing case for an eco-friendly alternative to Clarke’s usual. Lips had travelled across her bare shoulders to argue for the change, “You have amazingly soft skin, it’s a tragedy to subject it to harsh chemicals.”

Shirt folded and placed with other items in their rightful spots, the memory prompted a survey of how much of Lexa’s footprint has been embedded into the surfaces and depths of Clarke’s day-to-day. Evidence of Lexa’s editing of Clarke’s living space is strewn about. In both plain and discrete places.

Her mug was drying in the rack next to the kitchen sink. Two unripened avocados laid on the counter beside a box of her teas still out from their most recent grocery shop together. Her latest reading was lying faced down on the bedside table, book spine cracked open to where she’d last left off. Other books, partially started, veritably annotated, litter in nooks and crannies of various rooms. Linens and toiletries and wardrobes intermix, no longer keeping to separate shelves and drawers. One side of Clarke’s bed has taken on a recognisable dip, shape bent in the form of Lexa’s curve around Clarke’s body.

Pieces of her are everywhere Clarke looks, and in places she has yet to discover and would surely find post Lexa’s departure. It dawned on her then. This is it. Time has run out.

What she has put out of mind for a month of contracted love has finally come knocking. No more deals or contracts. Little way of temporary arrangements can assuage the permanent ache of an uncertain future.

The scenario where they would say goodbye at the airport the day after next, ending things on amicable terms with promises to call and possibly on genuine efforts to maintain long distance. Both would do their best to stay stoic, Clarke being particularly proud of herself for not crumbling when Lexa would give one final look over her shoulder, as achingly long and full of longing as would be her goodbye kiss, before walking towards her gate and her London life.

So with the fragments of love spread before her and about to be further scattered out of reach, Clarke rushed to Lexa’s place—actually running down tree-lined streets—with sudden haste to pre-empt the looming goodbye. Ready to beg that she wanted, _needed_ , Lexa to stay.

“Don’t go,” she repeats in the present.

Lexa’s features soften.

“I’m right here,” Lexa tries to soothe, embracing Clarke closer into her arms as physical evidence of her presence. “Want to come inside?”

Clarke shakes her head. Inside would mean a different kind of physical closeness, a falling into old patterns that would overtake communication of the type of falling that currently has Clarke thrumming with overwhelming nerves. Her drunken slip-up and the aftermath aside, she has managed to keep hands to herself and see through the rest of their arrangement without further lapses in judgment. Crossing the threshold, Clarke knows she would not be able to hold back. (No longer sees a reason to.)

Lexa looks confused but allows Clarke her geographic advantage, patiently drawing circles with her thumbs on Clarke’s hip bones. The movement is anchoring.

Lifting on her toes, Clarke draws Lexa into another kiss. Slower and sweeter at first but deepening by the second. Lexa adjusts reflexively, easily, to Clarke’s want. Lets her take the lead. Lets her lips trip over their own eagerness, her tongue take broad sweeps and small curls.

“I really like kissing you.” Clarke breathes into the small space cracked open between their mouths where her lips are cradling Lexa’s bottom one.

“I really like kissing you, too,” Lexa whispers back.

“Then don’t stop. Don’t go back to London. Stay in New York and keep kissing me.”

Lexa’s face morphs into understanding, finally tuning into the motivation behind Clarke’s sudden appearance and hurried kisses.

“We still have another day,” she tries to appease.

“I’d like more. A second, third. Several hundred dozens would be great.” _Tens of thousands, ideally, if the universe wanted to be generous about its time limit_ , she thinks. “I’m not ready for it to be over. Not yet.” _Maybe not ever._ “Stay, please.”

“Clarke, I can’t,” Lexa says, her hands on Clarke’s waist squeezing in apology. “I want to but I can’t.”

With the adrenaline left over from her run cushioning her senses, Clarke does not grasp the full force of Lexa’s rejection. With no other sound argument, she reiterates, “Don’t go.” Then on a swell of emotion and the sine of affection, she offers the only reason that could make a difference. ”I love you.”

It does not. The gut punch finally lands.

“I love you too but it doesn’t change that I have to go back, Clarke.” Lexa sounds confused like this shouldn’t be new information. She frowns. “I was meant to be in London already, by the first week of December, shortly after Thanksgiving. Remember? I had to push for these last three weeks as is.”

Clarke does remember. But she can’t help being greedy. Feeling frayed, she has to ask.

“Then push for more. _Please_. Can’t we have more?”

Clarke knows Lexa’s home is in London, that this was only ever meant to be temporary, but against all reason and real world practicalities, Clarke had held out hope Lexa would consider a change of plan. Her hope shatters with the resolve that’s seeped into Lexa’s gaze.

Lexa looks at her forlorn but resolute, with a degree of finality that has Clarke’s heart plummeting to the floor.

“Maybe I can buy another week, finish out the month and year. But beyond that, as much as I want to, I simply can’t stay longer,” Lexa enjoins her to understand, ducking her head to catch Clarke’s now bowed head. Clarke struggles to maintain eye contact. “If I could, I would have already moved mountains to make that happen.”

Silence and the sound of her heart breaking pulls a wall up between them. Each breath hurts more than the last. She nods, quick successive motions, accepting though not quite understanding.

“Clarke,” Lexa tries to catch her attention again.

Clarke takes a step back, retreating from Lexa’s door. Then two and three more backward into the hallway. Hand and heart wringing from the growing distance, but needing it more than air at the moment to breathe.

“I, uh ..,” she says through a glassy gaze as the shape of Lexa and what Clarke has come to know of love becomes just that bit more formless. Hazier around the edges, more hollow in the centre.

It’s possible Lexa reaches for her, tries to pull her back in, but things have gotten too blurry by this point to be certain. The distance too much to bare for her eyes to be anywhere but on the floor while her feet keep moving.

It’s possible Lexa calls for her, but the sound of her name is drowned out by her thundering pulse.

“Have a safe flight. Goodbye, Lexa.”

It’s possible Clarke uttered this aloud, but she can’t tell because her voice has gone reed thin, its audibility compromised by one repeating thought.

_I wish I could have been your forever._

Clarke turns her back and walks away.

Lexa doesn’t let her get far. It’s soft laughter that reels Clarke back in.

“I thought I was supposed to be the dramatic one in this relationship.” Arms wrap immediately around her stomach, then warmth envelops her back. Catching her from mid plunge off the ledge she needlessly flung herself over. Light puffs of air flutters against her neck. “Are you drunk again?”

“No.” Clarke protests, though she does feel lightheaded from a distinct lack of oxygen caused by her emotional aneurysm. “Don’t make fun of me. I’m sober and sensitive.”

Lexa squeezes her in apology. Chuckle petering.

Unexpected words then float softly against the shell of her ear. “I can’t stay but it doesn’t mean I want to go. Or for you to leave.”

She turns Clarke in her arms, locks her firmly in with hands hooked by the small of her back.

“I meant what I said before. I’m in this, Clarke. I want this. _You_. In whatever way I can have you.”

Clarke must have spent way too much time around Lexa because she can’t fight the pout forming.

“How does that work if you’re over there and I’m over here?”

Lexa takes a deep breath.

“I wanted to surprise you but evidently I’ve met my quota of surprises,” Lexa tells her, nervously tucking her hands in the kangaroo pouch of her hoodie. “I was saving it for the airport. I had this whole grand speech planned—a hallmark movie moment. It was going to be your early Christmas gift because I won’t be around by then.”

Clarke swallows at the thought, having forgotten about the upcoming holiday. She’s truly lost all sense of time.

“Saving what?”

“I know you have your life here in New York and your opening in January. And that you’d also want to be here for Octavia when she gives birth. I’m sorry I won’t be able to attend either events. But, if your schedule frees up afterward ... ”

Lexa trails off to pull an envelope from the hoodie pocket and pushes it gently into her hands.

It weighs more than a typical letter and makes a bit of a rattling, clink sound when Clarke lifts it to open.

She fumbles with the envelope flap, nearly giving herself a paper cut with her eagerness.

Inside is a key with an address taped to it on a sticky note and, Clarke gasps, a plane ticket.

“... come find me,” Lexa finishes her sentence.

Clarke stares at the thick piece of paper. Notes there’s no return date stipulated. It only reads ‘open.’

“If it’s not obvious by now,” Lexa continues, “and if I haven’t said it or shown it enough yet, I am so in love with you. I _would_ drop everything in London this very second if I could to hole up together in Brooklyn and forget the outside world exists, but since I have to do the adult responsible thing of seeing through my overseas commitments, I was hoping you would like to be with me while I sort them out.

“Poor Aden, my architectural assistant, is up to his eyeballs in paperwork picking up the slack in my absence. I’ve done what I can remotely to guide him but he’s long overdue a rescue from Titus’s scourge. I don’t want Aden to spend his Christmas dinner alone poring over site plans.”

Guilt gnaws at Clarke for keeping Lexa away. She’ll have to send Aden the biggest fruit basket in apology.

“There are at least two community housing projects that are in precarious stages right now awaiting council sign-off. The local campaigners only want to negotiate with me because of the relationship I have with City Hall. There are two other sets of drawings headed for D&AS planning application in the new year.”

Clarke vaguely recalls bits and pieces of this info Lexa had shared one evening while lounging on the couch after a long day of work. Her cheeks pink in further guilt to realise she must have nodded off, eyes glazing over whenever Lexa starts talking about architectural detailing.

“I know these are extremely boring bureaucratic realities that even I have lost drool over,” Lexa teases, inadvertently reading her mind and calling her out. She circles back to the thread of her explanation. “People are counting me. Staying is not a professional option for me at the moment. It may be someday. I just need more time to make it happen, to train Aden to take over. There’s no guaranteed timeframe of how long that might take and I’d rather be with you than without you given the uncertainty.”

Lexa gestures to the key.

“You can take that any way you want. An invitation for a short tourist visit. Or something longer, to move in with me until things are sorted and in the meantime take up temporary residence at any one of the London galleries that would be lucky to have you. Or a forever kind of deal that involves staking a more permanent claim in London’s eye-gouging housing market.” She explains that, since returning to the UK, Costia has moved in with Gaia, leaving their flat in Lexa’s hands till she decides on her next home. Lexa intends to sell regardless of her length of stay and makes clear Clarke will play a major part of the decision to remain canalside or go stateside. “Whether it’s a Georgian flat or a Brooklyn brownstone, whichever side of the Atlantic I eventually land on, in the end, I only want it if it’s with you.”

Lexa’s pitch is punctuated by her hands returning to Clarke’s waist. A firm, meaningful grip of her hips. She peers into Clarke’s watery gaze, a soft yearning, bracing for a reaction.

“It’s a good speech. I’ll think about it,” Clarke wisecracks, wiping a tear from the corner of her eye. While an obvious joke, it augurs well in Lexa’s favour that Clarke has sagged deeper into her hold, head falling forward and finding its home in the curve of her neck and shoulder. Now that the vise around her heart has loosen she can laugh at her manic self. “This is going to make me sound insane but I have a crush on you.”

“Hmm, if only I had a hint.” Lexa laughs, kissing the top of her head, releasing a long exhale in apparent relief it’s not an outright ‘no’ from Clarke. “I do, too, love. The biggest heart boner.”

Clarke’s cheeks burn from the force of her smile. Relieved that Lexa has stopped calling her, bro.

“The answer is yes, of course.” She blows out a breath as well, but feeling leftover embarrassment, scuffs her toe against the floor. “I might’ve panicked a little realising you’re leaving and I wasted this precious time with an inane scheme to keep you at arms length in misguided effort to re-balance the scale, which was not my most brilliant idea.”

Lexa smiles. Her gaze turns contemplative again.

“You know, Clarke, I get your counter-arrangement and why you wanted to see if we could work without sex. But in case there is any doubt, it’s not just lust for me. If I have to be abstinent for the rest of my life but get to keep you somehow, in some way, I would do it in a heartbeat.”

“God, I hope not,” Clarke says, horrified by the idea. While her chest thumps in elation of the long term prospect of their coupling, everywhere else balks at the no sex in perpetuity portion. With the throbbing between her legs she’s had to live with for weeks now, undoubtedly the rest of her body would have something to say about that.

Lexa traces the outline of Clarke’s jaw until her fingers nestle into her hair, gently combing through the tangled tresses. The intimate action quiets every doubt and anxiety that propelled her across town. Both hands go to rest on the nape of her neck.

“How about a brand new contract,” Lexa proffers. “We did everything but love, then everything but sex. I propose we get rid of all the ‘buts’ and keep only the everything.”

Clarke has not known happiness like this. But she has one last amendment before accepting. She shakes her head.

“I don’t want everything. Only you.”

The smile Lexa returns can be best described as unbottled love. It overflows.

As Lexa sweeps her into a kiss that lifts Clarke off her toes, Clarke thinks airport goodbyes have nothing on hallway hellos.

—

Lexa does push her flight back again, able to procure an extension to her project deadlines as well as secure Aden a large bonus and a week’s holiday reprieve from Titus’s glare.

They have until New Year’s together then Clarke will make the trip to Europe after her January show to rejoin her, a decision made over late night tacos and too much teasing about Clarke’s melodramatic turn. The rest they’ll figure out as they go.

This is how Clarke ends up at Lexa’s family cabin on Christmas Eve. Huddled in the warm intimacy of knowing there is more time to come. Heart settled.

“You can sing.”

“What?”

“You can sing,” Lexa repeats, firmer.

A memory flickers of wrapping Lexa in thick blankets and quiet ballads while she was sick.

“Oh, you remember that, huh?”

“It’s hard to forget while I was dying that a sweet, raspy voice was singing me to sleep.”

“You were not dying.” Clarke rolls her eyes, wiggling her toes against Lexa’s thigh.

They’ve taken extended post on the couch after dinner, curled up together. A slow evening to themselves ahead of the larger group’s arrival tomorrow. Christmas in the woods. A Woods family tradition.

Their overlapping circle of friends had cheered that Clarke’s neediness had eked out extra time with their favourite architect.

All of Clarke’s favourite people will be in the same room, including her parents and Lexa’s dad. It will be the second time meeting him. The first was some weeks back when Gustus unexpectedly dropped by Lexa’s apartment while Clarke was watering her plants out of guilt that Lexa had been neglecting them to spend time with her. The gentle giant had been delighted to be formally introduced to the cause of his younger daughter’s now ever-present smile. They had struck up a lively conversation and Clarke not only gained valuable intel on her girlfriend but gained a new ally against Anya. Learning of Lexa’s altered plan for the holidays, it was Gustus’s idea to have everyone come up to the cabin for Christmas Day. He lured Clarke with the promise that there will be childhood photo albums and that Lexa won’t be the one cooking.

She and Lexa made the trek a day earlier to carve alone time together ahead of the raucous. Now, snuggled in Lexa’s hoodie and with the fire crackling several feet away, warmed additionally by the homemade cider they had purchased on the road in, Clarke thinks it’s been one of her better ideas.

“Flu, fatality.” Lexa waves her off. “Perspective is everything.”

“Speaking of views,” Clarke deflects, gesturing in an emphatic, wide sweep of her arm to their surrounding, “why would you guys go camping if you own _this_?”

She recalls her breath being taken away when they rounded the bend of the gravel road leading to the view of three A-framed structures blacken in charred cedar siding. Lexa had explained it’s a 4,000 year old traditional Japanese exterior cladding technique called shou shugi ban. The Japanese art of preserving and finishing wood using fire. Or more commonly known as burnt timber.

Nestled amongst Carolinian pines, the pitch roofs peeking through are the sole hints of a woodland hideaway: two guest houses and one main building with an open-concept kitchen and living area for gathering. All three connected by glass bridges. While the front plays hide and seek amidst the greenery, the back of the plot opens up to panoramic views of the lake spanning as far as Clarke can see. The barn-sized sliding doors with floor to ceiling glass bleed the outside to inside. The northwestern exposure filtered in the soft light of a subdued but no less stunning sunset dappling through the trees when they pulled in.

Indoors, the ceiling soars. The vaulted space drawing Clarke’s eyes across exposed beams and down to custom-made industrial tinted fixtures. Wide plank flooring, handcrafted wood furniture and a meticulously detailed stone fireplace round out the features.

Lexa follows her gaze, non-plussed by the architectural splendour.

Her eye and taste are evident throughout. Clarke had an inkling she’s a talented designer but this is just criminal. She lets out a low whistle.

“Are you secretly rich?” Clarke asks as follow-up before Lexa could answer the first question.

Lexa laughs, shaking her head. “No, just a decade of side projects and family bonding over hammers whenever I’m in town.”

“Well, forget London or Brooklyn, let’s move in here.”

“Actually, that was somewhat the original plan, hence the two separate residences. Dad had envisioned this place as a second home for me and Anya and our eventual families.” Lexa gives Clarke a meaningful smile and squeeze of hand. “Especially after I moved abroad, and with how much Anya travels for work, he wanted somewhere we could both return to and feel grounded.”

The insight into the Woods dynamic doubles the warmth of the cider, Clarke taking a long swig.

“About camping, we’d always done it for leisure since I was little, our annual thing, but it became a necessity while building this before we got running water and a roof up. The tradition continued even after construction finished. Anya says it builds character. I think she’s over-fond of rolling in muck and wants to take us down with her.”

Clarke grins at the image. She draws circles with her thumb on the back of Lexa’s hand where a smudge from starting the fireplace has inked her skin dark, concurring, “A little bit of dirt never hurts.”

“We’ll go sometime.” Lexa vows, an echo of her pledge during their tent call.

Clarke fights a blush at the memory of the phone sex that followed that conversation. She grins. “Add it to the list.”

Her reference to the itemised romancing they’ve been diligently ticking off, brings out a mirrored smile from Lexa. There are few items left on the condensed list so Clarke is happy to expand it.

“Wouldn’t mind seeing you in some mud.”

“I bet.”

“So, not rich. Merely handy and tragically cursed to have tree-huggers for kin,” Lexa summarises as if she’s not the leader of the clan. Her expression turns sincere as she adds, “No more secrets or surprises between us. Promise.”

Clarke can’t say the same. She has one last surprise. A hastily formed plan to seal their final deal, Lexa unknowingly providing the perfect opening to initiate it.

“Speak for yourself,” she obfuscates with deliberate slowness, waggling her eyebrows and leaning in conspiratorial. “I can play the guitar.”

Lexa’s eyes widen comically at the turn of conversation back to music, then hand to heart, she feigns affront this hasn’t been public knowledge to date. On cue, she abandons Clarke in the next breath to rush upstairs and returns seconds later with an acoustic guitar in hand.

“Dad tried learning but he has very large hands and not much dexterity so it’s been collecting cobwebs for years. Refuses to give it away and keeps it hidden in the attic from Anya’s threat to use it as firewood. Play something?”

Clarke laughs at her breathless excitement. She had noticed the instrument while snooping around earlier when Lexa was chopping wood. It was with the discovery in mind that she revealed her hidden talent knowing Lexa wouldn’t be able to resist asking.

Despite the anticipated reaction, she feels sudden performance anxiety, nerves spiking.

Clarke takes the guitar and adjusts it on her lap while Lexa resituates on the couch facing her. Strums it experimentally and winces at the out of tune noise it makes. She tweaks each string’s tension in practised moves then looks back up to find Lexa staring in captive wonder like she had just finished an arena solo.

“What would you like to hear?”

“I don’t know, woo me.”

“I haven’t done this is in awhile,” she shyly admits, chuckling, plucking random strings and humming an absent tune under her breath.

Likely, going by the affected look Lexa is giving her, she can play Mary Had a Little Lamb and Lexa would find it impressive.

Clarke surveys their setting for inspiration, not having thought this far about which opening song to shake out the butterflies before building up to her intended show. Her search lands on the pine tree they had dragged in hours ago picked up from the tree farm. While she prepared dinner, Lexa had taken charge of its decoration. The silver and gold ornaments are evenly spaced as though she had taken a ruler to every placement. There was a battle cry when Clarke had carelessly tossed tinsel onto her work of art, dislodging more than a few balls. The base of the tree is neatly piled of presents set aside for their friends and families, with ample room for more incoming when the rest of the party arrive. Conspicuously absent are tags for Clarke and Lexa. It gives her an idea.

“How about ...”

Mariah Carey’s _All I Want_ is played and sung without breaking eye contact. The acoustic version flutters in the air in soft notes, the lyrics and melody lift and swirl around them matched to the dusting of snow that has started to descend outside. If Clarke never believed in holiday magic before, this would be the moment to start. Lexa listens enrapt, wearing a blinding grin.

For the next four minutes and three seconds, Clarke fixates on nothing but green and the dance of gold animating their change of hue from gripping awe to deep adoration. Their gazes are locked in. Like two satellites finding each other in the night sky, signals tuned into the same channel. Broadcasting to an audience of one.

They had first met on shaky ground, and over half a year things have tipped uneven one way or another, but with Lexa’s unwavering gaze on her now, Clarke feels steadier than ever. They are finally on the same page. Everything out in the open.

lt makes Clarke brave.

“Hold this,” she instructs, a soft request when the song ends.

Lexa cocks her head in question. “What are you doing, Clarke?”

“Your Christmas gift.”

Clarke is nervous.

“Is it the gift of invisibility?” Lexa jokes. Her eyes go to the empty space under the tree where there are no other boxes in sight next to the ones they had wrapped together for the others.

As soon as Lexa takes the guitar, Clarke strips off her top. Then her bottom too, until she is stark naked save for the reindeer socks on her feet.

Lexa visibly swallows. Stumbles to grasp for air. Clarke retakes the instrument.

She doesn’t reply. Lets the next two songs, modern renditions of holiday classics, be her verbal answer for the moment. Lexa doesn’t take her eyes off of Clarke’s lips. At the final chorus’s closing, she puts the guitar down and out of the way propped up behind the couch.

Standing, Clarke stretches a hand out for Lexa to take.

“This is my present for you.”

It’s cheesy and decidedly unoriginal but it’s the only thing she can think to give to Lexa that’s almost as good as a plane ticket and the promise of a future together.

Not since Lexa’s sickness have they been overtly intimate. With the exception of the night of their double date with Raven and Anya, Lexa has maintained her end of the LWB bargain. She has continued to love Clarke in ways that circumvent sexual desire and carnal longing evident in the tightness of fists preventing hands from reaching out as they want to do now. Has been respectful of boundaries even when they blur. Has been patient even when time was running out and it made less and less sense not to touch each other. Even after it was assured during Clarke’s hallway flailing that they’re mutually in it for the long haul. Lexa has kept to her side of the ledger.

Clarke wants to yield the shifted power dynamic back. For the night at least.

“Which is?”

“Soft and hard sex.”

Lexa splutters at Clarke’s blunt answer, almost spilling her drink. Her eyes immediately darken. She sets her cider on the coffee table. Twines fingers with Clarke and joins her on her feet.

“Are you sure? You know we don’t have to, right? I’m happy as is.”

Her soft sincerity—cementing what she’s said about abstinence—makes Clarke want to give all the more.

“I can make you happier,” Clarke says. “I’m sure.”

She has never been more certain. Or so horny. Chivalry is grand, but Clarke needs to come. The tree incident at the park aside, and discounting that tequila-fuelled morning interlude as a charitable contribution to their mutual survival, it has been three long weeks. Masturbating hasn’t cut it. A gross underestimation of what withdrawal would do. Since they have settled what happens post-flight, Clarke newly aches to have as much of Lexa as she can before their short separation.

“I desperately need you to fuck me,” she whispers in Lexa’s ear, lifted on her toes. “Bend me over. Make me beg. Mark me yours.”

Because Lexa has stopped breathing, Clarke shares the last of air coming from her own lungs. She closes the gap. Kisses her, full and intense. Ragged and reverent.

Clarke takes Lexa’s fingers and runs them up her inner thigh until they are enveloped in liquid heat. Strokes once. Twice.

She lets go of a shuddering breath but has to bite at her lip to keep in the moan.

“Is this something you’d want?”

Lexa nods. Head moving up and down so rapidly Clarke fears it may fall off. A laboured ‘yes’ is deposited into Clarke’s mouth before further concern arise. Her tongue adding confirmation.

Clarke leads them across to the residence half of the cabin and up to the larger of the two attic lofts. The space Lexa has claimed for themselves ahead of the other couples. A repeat of pitched ceiling and wooden beams from the lounge area is here enhanced by an overhead skylight bathing the bed in a canopy of stars, making it plain why Lexa planted her flag first.

This time, Clarke pays none of the architectural features any mind. Her attention is squarely on the rise and fall of Lexa’s chest, the look of utter arousal taking Clarke in, the indecisiveness of her gaze of where it should land, whether on the swell of Clarke’s breasts, the glistening between Clarke’s legs, or the curve of Clarke’s ass as she turns away to walk to the bed.

Clarke sits at its edge. Arms stretched out behind her, hands planted into the mattress. Legs open in invitation. Waiting.

“How would you like me?”

That snaps Lexa from her immobile reverie. After removing her own clothes, more clumsily than usual, she advances slowly toward Clarke, then kneels down in front of her. Settling in between her legs.

Lexa’s hands travel slowly up her thighs. Back down, slower still. They end at her knees and widen them incrementally to inch forward until a taut stomach meets a soft, wet core.

They moan in unison.

“Just like this.”

With one arm wrapping around her waist, Lexa tugs Clarke closer in a show of strength. Guides her to ground against her abs.

Clarke’s socked feet slip against Lexa’s back where they hook behind.

“No, keep the socks on.” Lexa enjoins when Clarke makes to remove them, her eyes clouding over in full blown lust. “I like them.”

The command in her voice makes Clarke wetter, moaning in response. The sound turns into a whimper when Lexa pulls her hair back and ties it into a top bun, then lowers her head.

The first lick causes Clarke to slam her eyes shut, her hips to buck. Lexa holds her still by the waist on the next several licks. The flat of her tongue drags and circles. The tip dips into her entrance on a number of occasions but goes no further than catching more fluid to spread Clarke wider. Her cunt throbs to pull it in deeper.

“Please.”

“Are we okay with penetration now?”

Her tone is teasing but Clarke appreciates the checkin nonetheless. She nods furiously, pushing Lexa’s head back down.

The next second, Lexa is inside. But it’s with her finger. Holds for a beat as though savouring the missed feeling then starts to penetrate her with shallow thrusts that increase in rapidness and fullness as a second finger joins the first.

Driven by the erotic sounds, Clarke cries in forewarning.

“Lexa, I’m gonna—”

“No.” Lexa softly denies, cutting off the prediction. Abruptly halts her movements. “Don’t come yet.”

Clarke doubts that’s within her control. She whimpers in complaint.

“ _Please_.”

“Bend over, love.” Lexa commands, tone at once gentle and rough with arousal. Its tenderness in contrast to what she’s asking. “Bend over,” she repeats. Her voice drops and along with it Clarke’s heartbeat down to between her legs.

Clarke scrambles to comply.

Lexa guides her to turn around on her stomach, drapes her over the mattress edge, then re-enters her from behind. Penetrates deep and slow then harder and faster.

The bed creaks under her effort.

After several thrusts, Lexa pulls back again. She reuses her tongue to give Clarke a moment of soft, aimless licking, staying on the surface. The orgasm denial makes Clarke squirm for more, pleading for friction.

Spreading Clarke wider, she draws tighter circles. Alternating between using the tip of her tongue and the flat of it. Clarke is nearly done for when lips cover her clit to intersperse the tongue fucking with sucking.

Her attention moves up to between her ass cheeks, with consent, Lexa’s tongue does its slow work of opening her up, of stretching her smaller tightness. At the same time, her hands sneak under to fill up on Clarke’s breasts. Unburdening the weight for awhile. Cupping and squeezing. Pinching and rolling her nipples.

Clarke is frantic and vocal about the sublime torture of in-consummate pressure below, humping the bed desperate for traction. But then, with stinging bliss, two fingers are rubbing her clit hard while another two retake their previous task pumping in and out. A thumb pushes in above. All moving in taught, furious strokes.

It takes everything in Clarke not to cry out.

The pressure is staggering and intense. The pleasure heady and hedonistic.

Without warning, Lexa pushes a third finger in below, aided by the dripping wetness to bottom to the last knuckle in a single go, and takes off at a blistering pace. Grateful tears form at the double penetration. Or is triple? Math is hard at the moment. All that is certain is that the countdown to her undoing has accelerated precipitously. Her loud expression of gratitude reverberates across the loft. Ready to tip over.

“Fuck, Lexa!”

But it’s met with a stubborn refusal to let her climax.

“Don’t come.”

“I— I can’t. I have to.”

The incredible fullness risks bursting her at the seams. She jogs her hips, searching. But suddenly finds empty air.

“If you do, I will stop,” Lexa warns, stalling her movements, and presses a contrarian gentle kiss to her temple, softer than her threat. “And we will go back downstairs and have more cider and put on a hallmark movie and fall asleep in each other’s arms.” That actually sounds divine to Clarke’s ears. Until Lexa offers her words back to her, a more tempting alternative. “Or you can let me do as you asked. Bend you over. Make you beg. Mark you as mine. Your choice.”

Clarke scrabbles together unknown strength and the last of her will power to accede. “I can hang on a bit longer.”

Not much, but she will try.

“It’ll be worth it, love,” Lexa assures. Another kiss to her head. The hitch in her voice tells Clarke she’s fairly affected too. “Let me show you how much I want you. Trust me?”

Clarke does. Completely. Rather than answer directly, she points to the duffle bag lying bedside where she had secretly packed their strap and a bottle of lube in the hope for such an opportunity to use. Over the next hour and forever, she surrenders wholly to Lexa.

Helped to the middle of the bed, on hands and knees with Lexa mounted behind her, one arm wrapped around her midsection while the other gathers pace fingering her in concert with the strap’s movement, Clarke is taken to the heights of pleasure only for Lexa to retreat at the precipice. Doubly penetrated but teased and edged beyond cognition.

Lexa checks in each time the ground recedes from view.

Clarke’s repeat answer is to soak the strap and Lexa’s hand in more of her fluids.

Lexa buries herself in gasping, erratic patterns, guiding Clarke back and forth on her fingers and the dildo through the unpredictability. The heavy bounce of her breasts is an exquisite pain that’s offset by the humid pleasure of an ardent tongue latching on as Lexa twists her upper body every so often to take as much of Clarke in her mouth as possible. Relieves their ache with such care, it intensifies the aching everywhere else.

“Lexa,” she whimpers, voice hoarse and resolve fading.

By the time she ends up rocketing back seated on Lexa’s lap, legs split wide, still facing forward but chin tipped up to the ceiling, body thrashing, screaming, _begging_ , the impending orgasm threatens to be the most powerful of their entire sexual relationship.

To rend her.

Ruin her whole.

Lexa pumps relentless, thumb moving on her clit between sweet and soft and rough attention.

Two fingers in her ass. Silicone pistoning in her cunt. Stretched to her limit, Clarke is shaking. Kneeled before mercy’s door, clawing for purchase. Trembling.

“ _Please_ , oh god, please, please, please.”

Her ragged, chanting plea is answered with a bruisingly tender kiss.

Lexa kisses her so gentle, at odds with the ferocity with which she is breaking Clarke apart. It pulls at the last thread of her tattered composure.

“It’s okay. You can come now.”

Clarke does. Forcefully. It’s a mess. A gorgeous, dreamy mess.

Music flitters above the surface of her cry, the song lyrics of Sleeping at Last’s Saturn finding crispness in the rush and roar of her ears.

How rare and beautiful it truly is, this existence. This momentary, planetary, flight.

How the universe was made just for it to be seen by those eyes. For Clarke to feel the weight of Lexa’s love in them.

Of brevity and gravity, with shortness of breath, Clarke at last tastes the infinite in the falling.

“I’ve got you.”

For all the immensity of stars that hang above, she can’t help but wish upon only one.

That she gets to have everything with Lexa. That they will always catch one another.

Then it’s Clarke’s turn to do so. She reaches down to stroke Lexa between her legs. The effect is immediate and Clarke is pushed forward and placed back on her elbows and forearms again, bracing as Lexa rides her to completion.

Free hand tightly gripping the headboard, Lexa’s hips drives into her. Wild and wanting. The tip of the dildo hitting even deeper than before. Pulling a second and third orgasm out of Clarke while she paints her rear in clear desire.

Clarke meant when she said she wanted the soft with the hard.

Nudging Lexa to roll over onto her back, removing the strap, Clarke spends the next hour reciprocating every prior move with its opposite one, every rough with gentle. Force with tender. Fast with slow. She worships the length of Lexa’s body. Leaves love notes along curves, gives thanks to spent muscles. Takes her in her mouth and with her fingers.

Repays orgasm for orgasm.

On the final one, Lexa comes deep and guttural. She collapses on top of Clarke. They fall sideways. Cradled together.

Following long showers and a short nap, the rest of the night blurs from there. Making up for a month of temperance. The bed becomes an unmade mess from their repeated coming together in wordless coitus communication. The rumbled sheets the evidence of love’s returned volleys and their bodies beggared want, love made over and again from the time of the sun’s disappearance until its reappearance; the cotton wrinkles a morning reminder of every vocal _please_ and quiet assurance there would be endless more nights like this.

Lexa keeps kissing as if tomorrow or a month or years from now the same eager lips would be waiting and wanting.

—

In the morning, pleasantly sore and blissfully content, they shuffle downstairs and bundle together again on the couch.

Lexa is swallowed up in a thick, cable-knit sweater. Santa hat askewed over tousled hair. Glasses back on. It takes every ounce of Clarke’s willpower not to take her back to bed.

“Your chin dimple confounds me,” Lexa says out of left field as she drinks her tea while Clarke sips on her coffee. She had ensured that the cabin would be fully stock so Clarke wouldn’t have to go without her hit.

So sunken into the familiar warmth of Wood’s and so taken with the company of this particular Woods, Clarke almost misses her comment.

“What?”

She laughs when the words catch up.

“Like, why there? Here I would have understood.” One hand comes up to stroke Clarke’s cheek. A thumb then moves to her chin, gently pressing into the slight indent, stroking the crease. “But here, it’s confusing.”

Clarke should be offended by Lexa’s criticism of an un-helped anatomical feature and its placement, but the softness of her gaze tells her to hold off on reacting.

“Well I hope it’s not a deal-breaker. I’m afraid there’s no refund policy with this chin.”

It involuntarily juts out in defiance on her behalf.

Lexa chuckles, a gentle sound. Her eyes gleam with happiness as she shakes her head. “No, I play for keeps.”

“That’s a relief,” Clarke says on an exaggerated sigh. “So, what has you stumped?”

“It feels unfair. You already have this,” she elaborates, her thumb moves up a few inches to the beauty mark above Clarke’s upper lip, then turns her attention downward again, “ _This_ is simply excessive. That kind of distraction shouldn’t be allowed to occupy such a small region.”

Clarke’s eyes flicker to Lexa’s lips, thinking of calling the kettle black at the concentration of beauty in one locale.

“There’s also a similar dip here.” Lexa presses the pad of her fingers to the tiny gap below her knee, a childhood bicycle accident. “I’ve spent an inordinate amount of nights staying up tallying all the marks of your body, and I haven’t come up with a plausible or conclusive answer about their distribution.”

“Why are you even cataloguing?”

“I’m trying to find a flaw,” Lexa says. The honesty amuses Clarke.

“How’s that going?”

“Not very well. The list is really short at the moment.”

“There’s a list!” Clarke exclaims faux-indignant, and demands, “Lemme see.”

“No, no list. I take it back. Zero flaws.”

Lexa pulls her in closer by the legs. Runs a hand up Clarke’s side.

“When we first met, and even after we started seeing each other as friends, I thought you were out of my league.” Clarke scoffs at the sheer inaccuracy of that statement but lets Lexa go on without interrupting. “So, I’ve been trying to find discrepancies to knock you several notches down to my level.”

Clarke laughs at her horrible (and unnecessary) strategy for rebalance.

“I know, it’s not very kind but like I said, you’re not playing fair so I have to cheat too.”

“What changed? When did you think you had a chance with this flawlessness?” Clarke teases, making a dramatic gesture at herself.

She doesn’t expect the answer that comes.

“The night we got together, the first time I made you come,” Lexa answers, and immediately follows up when Clarke rolls her eyes. “Not like that.”

“Like what then?” Clarke asks softly.

“I had you pinned against the back of your door and you were panting, breathless, above me. Clenching around my fingers. Holding on so tightly around my neck.”

Clarke swallows tracking along with the playback. Feels a sympathetic clench while fighting a furious blush.

“Then I moved us to the couch, carrying you with me. You trusted me so implicitly to not drop you.”

Her memory is hazy about the trip between door and couch but Clarke does remember the feeling of utter safety.

“I saw my chance there. A devastatingly pretty girl in my arms who didn’t want to let go, whom I could keep safe. It was the same when I took you up on the crane tower. You simply trusted I wouldn’t let us fall. I think I fell for you harder then.”

The stitched on Rudolph of Lexa’s sweater decides to make himself known then, his nose flashes red to match her hat. She looks ridiculous cast in blinkering light.

Clarke is so in love. There is not enough height between ground and sky to describe how far she has fallen.

So, she grabs a fistful of Rudolph and tugs Lexa forward. Clarke kisses her. Slow and sticky and warm.

Lexa’s ruminating and deepening of the kiss makes her want to retreat back upstairs, for that reason she needs to distract her before they _do_ end up spending the day in bed.

“On that note,” Clarke says, lingering at the corner of her mouth before reluctantly pulling back, “I actually did get you something for Christmas.”

Clarke disentangles her legs from Lexa’s to reach under the couch for the hidden box.

“Clarke, you didn’t have to.”

Despite her objection, Lexa unwraps it with care and extreme reverence. In the box are a safety vest, goggles, a hard hat and a harness set. Lexa smiles fondly pulling each item out.

“Babe, it’s sweet that you’re concerned for my onsite safety but you know I get these for free at work, right?”

“Yeah, but are they monogrammed?”

Lexa traces over the unsubtle insignia, “Property of CG”, the script hand painted into the corner of the vest. She grins, shaking her head. Brushes her lips against Clarke’s.

“Yours, huh?” Her smile falters slightly when she studies the items more closely. “Wait a second. Hey, these _are_ mine!”

“What’s yours is mine,” Clarke replies tongue in cheek. Her overflowing collection of borrowed personal protective equipment was getting ridiculous, and needed to be returned to their rightful owner.

Lexa smiles at the hard hat. “How many of these did you steal?”

She chuckles and bends down to pull out a different box from under the couch, ignoring the accusation. “This is your real gift.”

A new pair of headphones, identical to the one sitting in her apartment.

“Since I took yours, and don’t plan on returning them ever, thought you could do with your own.”

She takes it out of its packaging and gently places it on her head, mindful not to displace the Santa hat. Clarke retrieves Lexa’s phone sitting on the coffee table and plugs the cord in, navigating to the memo app to press play.

When the song starts, Lexa’s eyes light up.

“It’s you,” she gasps loudly, startling Clarke with her volume. She pushes back one cup behind her ear. Clarke’s voice and a soft melody can be heard muffling through. “When did you record this?”

Clarke shrugs. After Lexa had fallen asleep in the early morning hours following their night of reconnecting, Clarke was still wired. Body spent but love still thrumming, she needed an outlet for it to go somewhere. They’ll be separated for a month come January and this was her way to stay close to Lexa until she can come over.

“Thank you.” Lexa leans forward to kiss her on the chin, at her dimple. Pulling back after, her eyes sparkle. “There’s something else for you, too.”

Not to be outdone, apparently, she gets up and curiously goes to retrieve something from the tree, tucked away in the back in an area well covered with tinsel.

“Lex, you already got me something. What more could you give?”

Her girlfriend waves off her protest, busy rooting for her hidden prize.

Clarke watches with affection. She takes a comforting sip from her mug, feeling spoiled in this pocket of intimacy.

Lexa returns with a small box wrapped simply with a satin bow that has Clarke’s heart rate tick up.

“Lexa ...”

“This was my backup gift in case the plane ticket didn’t work out.”

Clarke stares speechless when she uncovers the content. Slowly, like the sunrise, a blinding smile overtakes her face.

“You got me Kelly?”

In her palm rests a miniaturised version of the machinery that started their whole journey. Clarke laughs.

“Here.” Lexa scoots in behind and cranks the dial on the back. The plastic toy replica starts to shake uncontrollably like a proper jackhammer. “She makes noise too.”

Clarke’s laughter rings brightly. Lexa joins in when Kelly over-exerts herself and falls out of her hand.

“For when you miss me and my banging ways, until we meet again.”

Clarke shakes her head, smiling. Lexa had made a noisy entrance into Clarke’s life. Then tried to make amends with noise-cancelling headphones to dampen the first impression. It took several arrangements and a number of adjustments over half a year to circle back to what Clarke now sees clearly from those early days. She doesn’t need quiet. Not when Lexa’s love is loud and vivid. In stereo and hi-def.

It’s reaffirmed when Clarke notices the other toy in the box. A mini crane.

“I’ll take you up in London.”

The promise is firm on Lexa’s lips. That there will be other heights climbed together. New city sounds to take in. More alternative views from above.

Something hopeful to look forward to in the new year.

Clarke sweeps Lexa in a kiss. She could not ask for more.

Coffees and cranes and everything _with_ love.

*********

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Six months and 33k words later, here we are, the conclusion of the LWB au au of [Except You Love](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13602705). Was going to post this before end-of-year but 2020 can fuck off. So cheers to starting 2021 on a more hopeful note of love. Thanks for reading. May this new year be kinder and gentler to all of us. Stay well everyone :)
> 
> I'm on Tumblr (sometimes) under the same username.


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